France has run a budget deficit for 51 straight years. In 2001, its government debt sat at 62% of GDP the lowest it had been since the euro was created. Today it’s 118%, almost double the ceiling Europe set for itself. Every headline tells the same story: the country spent too much, the bill is due, and the students in the streets are the symptom. Steve Keen the economist who predicted the 2008 crash before it happened says that story is backwards. He has studied debt for decades, and the number he says nobody in Brussels will name is the one that actually matters: French private debt sits nearly 100% of GDP higher than the public debt politicians fight over, and since the euro began, it has grown twice as fast.