For several months, the policies of successive governments in France have been conditioned by the level of the country’s debt. During the second and third quarters of 2023, the debt experienced a sharp increase, surpassing the symbolic threshold of 3,000 billion euros. This level places France among the 5 most indebted countries in the world.
The United States tops the ranking and has accumulated foreign debt of 32.9 trillion over the years. Moreover, this topic is at the center of controversy with every budget vote. Indeed, in recent years, negotiations between Republicans and Democrats have often been tense and cast doubt on this crucial vote for the nation’s operations.
The United Kingdom comes second in the ranking of debtor countries. The country’s private and public debt has reached $8.7 trillion. It is followed by Japan, the most indebted Asian country with $4.34 trillion. The Netherlands comes in fourth with an external debt of $3,790 billion. France closes out the top 5 with nearly $3.3 trillion in debt.
French debt above the threshold set by the 1992 European Treaty of Maastricht
It must be said that these figures are not calculated at the same time. Debt data are often reported over separate, but adjacent, periods. Note that this classification is carried out on the basis of external debt made up of public debt and private debt contracted by companies established in the country.
To return to France, data published by INSEE at the beginning of the year indicated that France’s public debt remained stable at 111.7% of gross domestic product (GDP) in the last quarter of 2023. The latter was a significant increase of 41.3 billion euros between July. and September. The increase is mainly due to an increase in government debt, which rose by 45.3 billion euros during the third quarter.
It should be noted that since it surpassed it in late 2002, France has never fallen below the threshold of 60% of GDP set by the 1992 European Treaty of Maastricht. Elsewhere, after being suspended for 4 years due to covid. -19 pandemic, as well as the war in Ukraine, these measures will be reactivated in 2024.
