Prince William and Kate Middleton are Destined for a Budget Wedding

The royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton may be long-awaited, but cash-strapped Britain may have a tough time paying for much of a shindig. In late October, the country announced a catalog of budget cuts that will total $131 billion by 2015. Prime Minister David Cameron's cuts are more savage than even the ones that made Margaret Thatcher locally reviled in the 1980s.

Brutalized by the global financial crisis, the United Kingdom is lumbering along in a period dubbed "Austerity Britain." Just a week ago, Whitehall in London was thronged with thousands of students who violently protested some of the most draconian budget cuts the country has ever implemented.

How can a country that is drowning in debt, thin on tax income and heavy on stimulus spending afford to throw the lavish "fairytale wedding" that the Western world seems to demand?