The US is in serious danger of running out of money at the end of this month. As if we didn't have enough to worry about already.

The list of problems is endless.

Pandemic lockdowns have left us drowning in debt. Years of near-zero interest rates and endless stimulus have whipped up an inflationary firestorm.

The resulting cost-of-living crisis has left millions of Britons facing a stark choice between heating and eating.

Now we have a banking crisis, too, as the world's safest asset goes rogue and lenders fall like dominoes.

Global house prices are crashing and it could be our turn next.

The IMF reckons the world is facing a "perilous phase" and could tip into recession.

Now we face the biggest threat of all, what one expert is calling a "genuine financial market catastrophe" that will reverberate around the world.

The US government is just days away from defaulting on its debts.

The US has just hit its debt ceiling, which means it cannot borrow any more money.

Most countries don't have a debt ceiling although perhaps they should, as borrowing has spiralled out of control all over the world.

Global government debt rose 7.6% last year to a record $66.2trillion (£53trillion), figures from Janus Henderson show.

By 2025, it will hit $77.2trillion.

The UK is a major offender. Our debt rose by another 6.9 percent to £2.57trillion last year, roughly equal to our entire economy.

But the US is the real debt monster as spending rages unchecked under President Joe Biden.

It accounted for more than half of last year’s global increase. Its total borrowings are almost as large as Japan, China, France, the UK, Italy and Germany combined.

Which worries some Americans, unsurprisingly. 

Equally unsurprisingly, given how politically divided the US is today, others reckon it's not a problem at all.

Now the two sides are heading for a showdown. The Democrats want to raise the debt ceiling so they can borrow still more money to fund their spending commitments, while many Republicans think that's the highway to fiscal hell.

If it’s not sorted by June 1, the administration will not have enough cash to pay its debts, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has warned.

They've got less than four weeks to sort it out and the clock is ticking.

Unless it's resolved, all hell will break lose and not just in the US, warned Andrew Hunter, deputy chief US economist at Capital Economics, who says it would fling us "into a genuine potential financial market catastrophe situation".

I thought we were already there, but apparently not. It's actually going to get worse.

Great.

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The US debt ceiling was originally set in 1917, at $11.5billion. It has since been hiked more than 100 times, and today stands at a thumping $31.4trillion.

You might wonder what's the point of a debt ceiling that you can simply lift whenever you feel like it, but that's another argument.

Any increase must be voted through the House of Representatives, which has a Republican majority.

Last month, Republicans did agree to raise the limit by $1.5trillion, but only if Biden slashes spending. The problem is that if he agrees, the bill won't pass the Senate, where Democrats are in the majority. 

What a mess.

US government bonds – issued to fund the country's spending – are supposedly the safest asset in the world. Global investors hold $24.3billion of them.

If the US defaults it will trigger a financial earthquake. Borrowing costs everywhere will rocket. Then the UK may get its house price crash after all. As well as a stock and bond market crash. It won’t be pretty.

Only gold and Bitcoin will benefit.

The US has fought over the debt ceiling before but there are two differences this time. First, the stakes are higher given the sums at stake. Second, the Democrats and Republicans hate each other. Throw Donald Trump into the mix and it will get even more volatile.

You never know, we might get lucky and there'll be a last-minute patch up. Unfortunately, luck has been in short supply lately.