📈 Insight Loop: The World has a Borrowing Addiction
Governments worldwide keep borrowing to survive, but now they are addicted. Can the world ever go clean?
So, here’s a fun little number to start your day: $111 trillion. That’s how much public debt the world is carrying right now. We somehow piled on another $8 trillion since last year. At this scale, it’s clear that much of the global economy is running on borrowed money.
What’s actually worrying isn’t just the size, it’s the speed. Debt has become the universal shortcut, a quick fix for government problems, from crises to campaigns. But patching long-term issues with short-term borrowing is the economic equivalent of taking out a loan to fix a leak in the roof and simply hoping the rain holds off. The truth is, it is a storm, and it won't blow over.
As this colossal figure continues to climb, it begs the ultimate question: Who are the world’s creditors, and how long before the global debt collector starts knocking?
The Techloy chart below shows the top 10 countries with the largest government debt, as of November 2025, with the U.S and China holding more than every other country combined.
