<story><title>Trillions in Bad Loans May Sap World Economy for a Long Time</title><url>http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/business/dealbook/toxic-loans-in-china-weigh-on-global-growth.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>ihsw</author><text>Why not forgive the loans? The negative affect of debt on people&amp;#x27;s capacity to contribute to the world economy is high, and I think it stands to reason that people would contribute more for the duration of paying off their loan if the loan wasn&amp;#x27;t hanging over their head.&lt;p&gt;The banks would scream bloody murder, obviously, but their slack policies got us into this mess in the first place.&lt;p&gt;The intention is to throw people a rope to save them from drowning, but the rope is ending up as a noose around their neck more than anything else. The government&amp;#x27;s may have had good intentions in their support for the proliferation of subprime lending, but I think it would&amp;#x27;ve been more effective to &lt;i&gt;just give people money&lt;/i&gt; without the expectation that they pay it back directly. It will find its way back into the economy as, so to speak, &lt;i&gt;trickle up economics&lt;/i&gt;.</text></comment>
<story><title>Trillions in Bad Loans May Sap World Economy for a Long Time</title><url>http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/business/dealbook/toxic-loans-in-china-weigh-on-global-growth.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>johnm1019</author><text>Wouldn&amp;#x27;t this only sap the global economy if all those bad loans were backed by average Joes, who were then hurt by the loss of return?  If instead they were backed by governments and multi-national conglomerates who already had hoardes of (free?) cash, then the effect on the economy would be limited.</text></comment>