Description

Do big government debts and fast rates of adding to them threaten our
collective well-being? In this groundbreaking analysis, Ray Dalio, one
of the greatest investors of our time and the #1 New York Times
bestselling author of Principles, shares the reasons behind his fears
for the US debt markets, answering some of the most important market and
economic questions we now Are there limits to debt growth? Can a big,
important reserve currency country like the US really go broke? Is there
such a thing as a “Big Debt Cycle” that can tell us when to worry about
debt and what to do about it?

For decades, politicians,
policymakers, and investors have debated these questions, but the Big
Debt Cycle that helps answer them is not talked about or well
understood. With the US debt issue coming to a head, Dalio’s How
Countries Go Broke provides the first-ever detailed analysis of the Big
Debt Cycle, explaining its implications and offering a surprisingly
straightforward solution to getting debt problems like the ones the US
faces under control.

Dalio has built his career as a leading
global macro investor by studying the patterns of history to develop
unconventional perspectives on what’s happening in markets and economies
today. It was this approach that led him, in the years leading up to
the 2008 Great Financial Crisis, to study the Great Depression and other
past big debt crises and use what he learned to navigate the turbulent
markets successfully. By looking closely at thirty-five cases over the
past 100 years when governments have gone broke and studying the
mechanics behind them, Dalio has developed a first-of-its-kind template
for what to watch for and what to do when the threat is significant as
his measures show that it now is. He has discussed this template with
treasury secretaries and central bankers from around the world and is
now sharing it with the public to help bring urgent attention to the big
risks the US and a number of other countries face—and to explain how to
avoid the worst-case scenario.