Not Raising the Debt Ceiling: A Crisis, If We're Lucky, a Historic Calamity If We're Not - If we don't raise the debt limit, we know we would get mega-austerity and maybe a new financial crisis. But just how bad could it get?

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/10/if-congress-wont-raise-the-debt-ceiling-obama-will-be-forced-to-break-the-law/280176/