The World’s First Global Debt Clock

Photo used under Creative Commons license by Flickr user <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/roby72/">Roby©</a>.

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World leaders are gathered today at the UN General Assembly to discuss reforming the international financial system, laying the groundwork for a global climate change agreement and many other costly and contentious issues. They would do well to remember the money that has already been wasted through inaction (and costly wars) by consulting the Economist Intelligence Unit’s new Global Debt Comparison tool.

Featuring the EIU’s reams of data on countries around the world from as far back as 1999 and economic forecasting stretching out through 2011, this nifty display allows one to compare public debt per capita, public debt as a percentage of GDP, total public debt, and the yearly rate of change in debt. As of this morning, the clock rang in at an eye-watering $35 trillion…and growing. Check it out!

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WE'LL BE BLUNT.

We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

You're here for reporting like that, not fundraising, but one cannot exist without the other, and it's vitally important that we hit our intimidating $390,000 number in online donations by June 30.

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