Japan Becomes Largest US Debt-Holder

It's not surprising really. I've been in a class in high school where a 16 year old girl couldn't find Canada on the world map... I'm sure most people aren't all that educated about other countries aside from their own.

Our education system covers plenty about other countries, thank you.

IMO, it's not about the education system as much as it is the individuals. I know there was a lot more stuff taught to me in HS than I retained.

As does ours :D token retards dont paint accurate pictures of the whole most of the time

HURR MISS CALIFORNIA'S IGNORANCE IS INDICATIVE OF AN ENTIRE COUNTRY'S LOL

Completely agree. You can teach your socks off, if the pupil isn't listening then its all for squat.

But the poster I quoted was stating that people weren't taught, which I know certainly isn't the case in the UK.

While you are right but there is a lot of evidence (inc some of the posters on here) that some americans don't have a great understanding of the world outside their country.

I think this one nails it. Around 80% of all Americans don't even own a passport, so I guess it's more of a mentality as well.

But he was talking about Americans. :o

Are you going back that far to the colonial times?

While that would be fun, I think I will pass.

As I'm sure some English people dont either :( I think there was a funny video on youtube where instead of some pompous englishman asking fatties in NYC where the great wall of china is, someone asking british people about the rest of the world and the responses were lulzy

Oh yes, there is plenty of idiots here to.

But generally (and yes I am talking in generalisations) those idiots in the UK are slightly less vocal and 'obvious' as their american counter parts.

I did see an Australian questioning the american public which was similar to the one you describe.

wait... Europe is made of multiple countries?

I just found out that Japan is the 61st largest country out of 233, I did not know that. Also, it is larger that 28 states, I am impressed.

It also has the seventh largest military in the world by expenditures, which surprises the hell out of most Americans. Especially when they find out the US sold them all their best military tech to build it.

Japan has purchased most of the US military's favorite toys except nuclear weapons, but that's really only on a technicality. They have the nuclear components, and the warhead / missile technology, and estimate it would only take a couple weeks or months to throw the two together.

pssh money isn't real

Not surprising at all. The evidence is available for all to see.

I'm just waiting for someone to start the theory that Japan is going to bankrupt the US then attack...

oh wait...

Hell Who needs Nuclear Warheads to defeat any country, when you can either use the raw materials to build alot of these babies, or build a specific few that can interjoin to make 1 big ultimate war machine...I can see it now, a transformer laid waste to North Eastern ( Input Country name here) as for example.

Screw it I should move to japan and live there. ATM it's a better place to live than us.

check your stats.

http://www.ustreas.gov/tic/mfh.txt

Your stats are from 2009. Article I linked is from last month, after China sold off a bunch of their treasuries.

"China trimmed its holdings of U.S. debt by 34.2 billion U.S. dollars in <b>December 2009</b>, leaving Japan as the largest holder of U.S. Treasury securities, the U.S. Treasury Department reported on Tuesday."

You're linking to "period" stats. Basically, investment series. They're delayed by several months under that model.

From Bloomberg:

"Japan’s holdings rose 1.5 percent in December to $768.8 billion while China’s dropped 4.3 percent to $755.4 billion."

if you think for one second think that the U.S.A did not sell nuke rights to any country you are highly mistaken
that is the fault of any freaking nation you can only try and do you best and keep something secure. at today's date and knowledge pft. school boys can make.
further more U.S.A loves japan with no holds bar

Americans only learn about countries after we invade them. People thought Georgia was a state, some still do and dont know that there is a country named Georgia, which was part of the former Soviet Block.

we live on a learning curve

To be fair stuff over there changes way more often then we update our text books

hmmm. how about this?

bloomberg/bw march 15th

(sorry, didn't mean to chew out numbers with you. just thought it was weird that i missed this on npr. also i get peeved about this japan > china sentiment.)

Its sort of odd, that Japan has such a hand in our Public Debt. Looking at wikipedia (please don't chastise me, some think its a valid source), we can see that Japan is #2 in the world in percentage of Debt to national GDP and the United States is lower down the list. The national debt in Japan is bigger than their economy, our debt is only around 40% of our GDP. Their economy is listed at US$5trillion, where ours is USD$14.4 trillion. Our debt may be bigger, but Japans is bigger in terms of proportion to GDP.

I used wikipedia for all the numbers, I saw something on CBS about economies the other day. Japan may have the biggest chunk of our debt, but their debt is proportionally more.

The only reason I know, is because I was born over there when it was still called Soviet Union <.< and lived through the collapse of Communism. I was actually in Moscow when it happened and it wasnt pretty.

Don't fool yourself, China still holds a substantial amount of US debt.

This may frighten some people, but I actually find comfort in China's large holding of US debt. It provides them a financial incentive to see the US do well. Without the back and forth between China and The US I fear the types of foreign policy China would unleash in the Asian sphere. It hasn't ever had good relations with Japan or Taiwan, two countries The US continues to support. There are violent protests by the Chinese people any time a Japanese government official visits the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo that honors Japanese war dead (including 14 war criminals).

In Zhongguancun on April 9, 2005 there was just such a protest by roughly 10,000 students from Beijing University and Tsinghua University -- China's M.I.T. and Harvard. They were demonstrating against Japan and what they considered its failure to properly acknowledge the atrocites it committed when it occupied China during World War II. They marched through the heart of Beijing and pelted the Japanese Embassy with bottles, tiles, stones, and eggs. They smashed electronic billboards advertising Canon cameras and other Japanese electronic products. They kicked and hammered Toyota cars and trucks. They broke windows of Japanese banks and restaurants. And at the end The Chinese police -- The People's Armed Police -- had buses waiting to take them back to their classes. Exclaiming through loudspeakers "You have vented your spleen, enough now"

Imagine this type of state sponsored hate, only with less restraint.

There was a term for the sort of funded debt, where someone or country would be in debt to another country or person just to have increased concern from the lender. Is china more or less likely to assist us if any national disaster would strike due to the debt we hold? I wonder if it isn't just politics, maybe holding N.Korea in line by manipulating the Chinese.