Why, then, are we so worried about US government debt if it is still the best of all the bad options; the deficits that generate it are mainly cyclical; and, as we shall see later in the book, its level pales in comparison to the private debt carried by the citizens and banks of many other states? The answer is that we have turned the politics of debt into a morality play, one that has shifted the blame from the banks to the state. Austerity is the penance—the virtuous pain after the immoral party—except it is not going to be a diet of pain that we shall all share. Few of us were invited to the party, but we are all being asked to pay the bill.

Mark Blyth, Austerity, loc. 56