Before I get to the point, I have to look at something. Here's a detail from Table D3:
The numbers don't add up. 11 plus 4 is 15, in this case fifteen point two something. Not 16.9. And yet we are told that household debt "includes consumer debt and mortgage loans." We are told "the two components of household debt" are consumer credit and mortgages -- "the two", as if there is no other. We are told:
about 70% of household debt in our economy was made up of housing-related debt (i.e., mortgage loans and home equity lines of credit). Remaining household debt was made up of student loans, auto loans, credit cards and other consumer debt.
So it's not like they left something out.
But they did leave out $1,616.806 billion dollars from the recent data. And it's not a glitch, not a typo, not a one-time thing. Since 1946, there is always 9 (plus or minus three) percent of "Total" Household debt (CMDEBT) that is not counted in the Home Mortgage and Consumer Credit components listed in Table D3.
I wonder what it is, and why.
Okay. Now, back to the point I wanted to make...
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