Editorial: Almost everyone in the red

There has been something of a "meltdown" in world financial markets, by all accounts.
An odd term, "meltdown".
Because arguably that's the only likely way out for economies under seige ... melt down your gold reserves and pay your bills.
The major shareholding players and economies were rattled badly yesterday - but then that's something we are tending to get familiar with now. Since the crash inspired by over-exuberant and sightless American banking corporations a few years back, there have been regular aftershocks.
You almost get used to them, until the ripple effects from the initial upheaval and its aftershocks begin to rattle your own doorstep.
But yesterday's meltdown was not associated with a banking collapse, which was all about the debts built up in the private sector - this was triggered by a crisis of debt on individual country levels.
There was a flare-up a couple of months back when Greece announced it was effectively bankrupt. The omens were not good, financial analysts said. If Greece fell, the rest of the EU was likely to get seriously sideswiped. Just too much debt.
And now Spain and Italy are making similar noises, and of course the big player in all this is the United States, which has started to tremble at governmental level under debts not in the billions, but the trillions.
There's all sorts of talk about the 2008-inspired recession getting another dreadful lease of life because of this, although New Zealand is not in a bad place at this time, some financial analysts have said.
We are in reasonable shape, for a relatively isolated and small country without a great sea of oil under us. But we are at the mercy of those big players and their growing unease, and at the mercy of the oil market and international conflicts ... and that's not fair.
... Because Kiwis tend to keep their heads down and get on with it and pay their bills the best they can. Economically, I think we cut our cloth accordingly and do pretty well. We won't go broke.
So who does the US owe all that the money to? Hire purchase companies?
No ... so it must be the World Bank. So where did the World Bank get all that cash to keep lending to the US?
It must be an endless pit because, by all accounts, about 95 per cent of all the countries on planet earth are in the red. Greece got bailed out, now it's likely to be the US' turn.
But where does the money come from? Who has all the money to lend?
Here's my prediction ... in 2018 New York will be re named New Shanghai.