Why bankers are not the only wankers.

I was talking to a friend earlier who was curious about the state of the economy.

She started out by pointing me towards this rather informative, yet simplistic flash animation for anyone who doesn't understand the term "credit crunch". Have a look.

The Crisis of Credit Visualized.

Mr Jarvis raised a lot of questions in her head. We talked about how long would it take to fix and why people kept doing that when they knew the consequences. Then we got talking about money.

Which led me to another thought, Did you know that the money you have in your pocket is not actually money?

Side note: I had a Morpheus moment there, specifically the one in which he says "do you think that's air you are breathing?"

Its just a promise to pay the bearer the sum of the bill you are holding. A receipt. A sort of contractual obligation supported and paid for by the government.

Back in the good ol' days, the sum of money in an economy was actually backed up by precious metal reserves like gold or silver. By the 90s, most countries had switched from that to 'Legal tender' where the Government bestows value on the money.

On one hand this removes the limits of having gold for every pound stored somewhere and allows economies to blast off. On the other hand, It creates wild fluctuations like this. By creating an illusion of money in existance while the same not being true about it in circulation, It paints a odd picture of financial health. India, for example, is touted as becoming the next big market/economy/thing even though disparities exist in larger gaps than before.

This construct of 'free money' is both bad and good. Bad because it gives you the money to seriously fuck things up when you run out of fingers to count on, i.e. lose track of it. Good because my degree in Commerce is now actually making me feel happy (which I thought was impossible)!

Knopfler and the boys from Dire Straits sang Money for Nothing (....and chicks for free). The song talks about a record store owner's rant over how easy it was to "play the guitar on the MTV" and become a rock star for kicks.

That was the soundtrack running in my head whenever I listen to people moan about bankers being wankers. While I agree most of them are puppets of soulless organisms designed to slurp your life up like spaghetti bolognese, I don't think they are really *all* to blame for the problem.

Sure, they gave us easy credit - Overdrafts, loans with little or no collateral value and credit cards you could use to wipe the blues away - but who lapped it up and used it with abandon? There's no use hiding behind the facade that "They made it sound so easy" or "Everyone else was doing it" - what matters is that we gave in to it. We gave in to the culture of want.

I wont lie. I'm not exactly debt free. Got a student loan to pay off and owe many friends money, All of which weigh heavily on me and give me a fair deal of stress. Slowly though, I'll try to make my way on top of this.

And if ever I lose the grace of sane thought and go on a rant, you are more than welcome to put me in my place.

Until then, lets listen to some good ol' music.


We gotta install microwave ovens,
Custom kitchen deliveries,
We gotta move these refrigerators,
We gotta move these colour TV's, Lord!

Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it,
You play the guitar on the MTV,
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it,
Money for nothin' and your chicks for free,
Money for nothin' and chicks for free,


- Money for nothing by Dire Straits.