🇸🇹 São Tomé and Príncipe vs 🇺🇸 United States

Live side-by-side comparison of government debt. The United States currently owes about 64133.8× as much as São Tomé and Príncipe — a gap of $40.66 trillion. Updated every second from each country's baseline figure; sources below.

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São Tomé and Príncipe
$634,038,359
Debt-to-GDP59%
Per citizen$2,588
Per second+$2
Net debt, % of GDP—
Net interest, % of GDP0.6%
Interest, % of revenue3.1%
VS
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United States
$40,663,306,282,079
Debt-to-GDP124%
Per citizen$118,608
Per second+$79,753
Net debt, % of GDP97%
Net interest, % of GDP3.2%
Interest, % of revenue10%

Net debt and interest: IMF World Economic Outlook, October 2026, general government, 2025, mostly IMF estimates. A dash means no comparable figure. How these are calculated.

In nominal terms, the United States carries the larger government debt — roughly 64133.8× that of São Tomé and Príncipe, a difference of $40.66 trillion. Debt-to-GDP (São Tomé and Príncipe: 59%, United States: 124%) says more about the burden than the raw total does.

Among the 194 governments tracked here, São Tomé and Príncipe ranks 84th by debt-to-GDP and the United States 13th. Measured per person, São Tomé and Príncipe is 118th and the United States 2nd.

Analysis

By total government debt, São Tomé and Príncipe ranks 180th and the United States 1st among the 194 sovereigns tracked on this site.

On a per-citizen basis the picture can look different from the nominal totals: a resident's notional share of the government debt in the United States is roughly 45.8× that in São Tomé and Príncipe ($118,608 vs $2,588 per person).

The debt-to-GDP picture is asymmetric here: the United States sits at 124% of GDP, well above São Tomé and Príncipe's 59%, meaning the United States owes far more relative to the size of its own economy — even where the nominal, dollar-for-dollar comparison above suggests otherwise.

The IMF puts the United States at 97% of GDP net of financial assets, and publishes no net debt figure for São Tomé and Príncipe. São Tomé and Príncipe spends about 3.1% of government revenue on net interest ($6 million in 2025), and the United States about 10% ($980.6 billion in 2025). See the full interest ranking.

The gap between them is widening: the United States' debt is growing faster in dollar terms ($80K/sec vs $2/sec for São Tomé and Príncipe), adding roughly $6,890,486,400 to the difference each day.

Scale is part of the story too: the United States' population (343M) is about 1399.4× São Tomé and Príncipe's (0M), which is part of why the nominal and per-capita comparisons above can point in different directions — a government's debt load scales loosely with the size of both its economy and its population, not either alone.

This analysis is generated automatically from live data as an educational orientation, not financial advice — see the methodology page for definitions and caveats.

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Source: Global Debt Clock, based on the IMF World Economic Outlook (October 2026, general government gross debt) and US Treasury data for the United States.
Live data: /api/compare?a=st&b=us · São Tomé and Príncipe page · United States page
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