US Government Debt Different - Finance Department - University of ...

Charles W. Mooney, Jrof multinational debtors is emerging. This holds promise that futuresovereign debt restructurings might be undertaken under the ruleof law—that is, new regimes of insolvency designed for sovereignand other governmental debtors. But there is an important caveat tothis suggestion. In order to inspire confidence, any such insolvencyregime should be seen as fair to all concerned. It should be a real andrecognizable insolvency regime with many of the traditional (in therelevant state) elements of such a regime. Ideally, moreover, it wouldbe enacted in better times and not on the eve of a default.235