»We mustn’t start bingeing on savings,« says Peer Steinbruck as Minister of Finance. Since the fifties, (West) Germany has been running up fresh debts each year. In the seventies, it was no longer able to repay its debts, and since the nineties the new debt it has been taking up hasn't even been enough to pay the interest on its old debt.

In The Catch with the Credit a reporter investigates the hole in the wallet, the bingeing and the looming consequences, and he stumbles across some unexpected causes and effects. Strange as it may seem, the question: »What will happen if we go on like this?« is one of the few media taboos of our times. Although financial journalists worry daily about debt mountains and debt traps and spout many well-meaning homilies, the one thing they never mention is where we will end up if – as seems most likely – things carry on just as they are.