The Burden of the Debt Depends on How You Measure It

A Reuters article in the NYT told readers that:

"Japan's public debt burden is already the worst among major economies at more than twice the size of its $5 trillion economy."

While Japan does have the highest ratio of debt to GDP among wealthy countries, it also has one of the lowest ratios of interest to GDP. Its net interest payments are less than 1.0 percent of GDP. This number would be even lower if payments made to the central bank were subtracted out. (These are refunded to Japan's tre...