Re: California defaults!
Getting Paid in IOUs
California's Bingo Bondage
By CARLOS BENEMANN
...
Left to itself, California is toast.
A similar problem was faced by the provinces (States) in Argentina in 2001. Argentine Provincial governments issued the same kind of fancy engraved paper warrants (called bonos, i.e. bonds). Problem was nobody wanted them, not even the provincial banks because they carried no interest. The neat solution to make them desirable to the general population was that once a week, there was a lottery called over radio and TV that would call out the serial numbers on the lucky winning "bonos" and you could win a car, a motorcycle, a dishwasher, even a house if your winning IOU number came up. Of course the idea was to get people to retain the money for as long as possible. It sort of worked for a while and the bonos became paper flood in all kinds of horrendous astronomically high denominations. (Guaranteed by the good name and faith of the local Argentine government!!). Right!
Just picture a poorly paid local state employee and his taxi driving son and their large families sitting in their cramped, modest living room at night shuffling stacks of the IOU's around as the string of winning numbers are called out on the radio. I witnessed this. (Of course the big winners always turned out to be the governor's mistress or some such, but that is Argentina and another story).
Pretty soon, every province and city government in Argentina issued it's own "bingo bonds" but you could not take this quasimoney "out of state" so to speak because they had zip zero zilch value outside their own local jurisdiction. (No value whatsoever in fact because everyone had their own competing lottery)
..
http://www.counterpunch.org/benemann07062009.html
there is a solution
Originally posted by metalman
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Getting Paid in IOUs
California's Bingo Bondage
By CARLOS BENEMANN
...
Left to itself, California is toast.
A similar problem was faced by the provinces (States) in Argentina in 2001. Argentine Provincial governments issued the same kind of fancy engraved paper warrants (called bonos, i.e. bonds). Problem was nobody wanted them, not even the provincial banks because they carried no interest. The neat solution to make them desirable to the general population was that once a week, there was a lottery called over radio and TV that would call out the serial numbers on the lucky winning "bonos" and you could win a car, a motorcycle, a dishwasher, even a house if your winning IOU number came up. Of course the idea was to get people to retain the money for as long as possible. It sort of worked for a while and the bonos became paper flood in all kinds of horrendous astronomically high denominations. (Guaranteed by the good name and faith of the local Argentine government!!). Right!
Just picture a poorly paid local state employee and his taxi driving son and their large families sitting in their cramped, modest living room at night shuffling stacks of the IOU's around as the string of winning numbers are called out on the radio. I witnessed this. (Of course the big winners always turned out to be the governor's mistress or some such, but that is Argentina and another story).
Pretty soon, every province and city government in Argentina issued it's own "bingo bonds" but you could not take this quasimoney "out of state" so to speak because they had zip zero zilch value outside their own local jurisdiction. (No value whatsoever in fact because everyone had their own competing lottery)
..
http://www.counterpunch.org/benemann07062009.html
there is a solution
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