When budget experts take our debt’s temperature, the statistic they rely on is the debt to GDP ratio. Like banks or families, richer countries can borrow more, safely.
Now take a look at the graph of debt-to-GDP throughout American history below. If you draw a straight line across the picture at 30 percent, you touch some of the most wrenching periods in American history: 1) The American Revolution; 2) The Civil War; 3) WWI; 4) The Great Depression and WWII; 5) The early 1980s recession and the end of the Cold War…
http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/the-u.s.-middle-class-is-being-wiped-out-here's-the-stats-to-prove-it-520657.html?tickers=^DJI,^GSPC,SPY,MCD,WMT,XRT,DIA
Interesting concommitants.