We live in a world where the difference between assets and liabilities has been blurred. In the old days, an asset was something you “owned” while a liability was something you “owed”. Over the years as everything became securitized, someone else’s liability is now routinely someone’s asset but ONLY thought of as an asset. It has always been this way but in the past what used to be seen as “someone’s liability” is now ONLY seen as “someone’s asset”.
In an article peened by Doug Short last week we can see how far this anomaly has gone
http://wolfstreet.com/2016/03/
Looking at the asset side of federal government “total financial assets” we can see how crazy this concept has become.
THE LARGEST financial asset held by the federal government is “student loans” making up 45% of the pie. I am sure you see the problem with this but I think it needs to be spelled out because it is the core of how far down the rabbit hole we have gone!