h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Those h2g2ers who own or run major banks in this country, will you please start lending to other banks more than overnight to free up the cash flow for loans and mortgages and businesses and put an end to this present crisis of confidence in the banking system? After all, we in the UK have lent/given you more than enough money to start you off. Why not start with the odd fiver?

And those of you who run the share- and money-markets, can you put the prices up a bit so we can all feel a bit happier?

Then we can slide into the coming depression rather than hurtling down head first with the Government and taxpayers ending up flat broke

Thank you.

The Jabberwock (official title)

the credit crunch does not exist.
it all artificial created money, anyway.
just use paper shredder.
start over...

hey, good old karl (founding member of the marx bros.) warned you more than a century ago.

but would you listen? noooooooo!

look at it this way: you live & learn

And it's great to see that Gordon Brown Trousers invited no other than Honby-Dublo to advise him as to what to do next! Sensible really as the chap managed to bankrupt a bank, take a couple of million as a bonus and get a new job on the board of the one that bought the 'insurance write-off'. Presumably GBT is looking for ways of increasing his bonus when he bankrupts the entire economy. I am only surprised that he didn't ask the Lemur Brothers ex-boss.

if you moan, those who have it(money) say get a life, once I can get past just existing then I might have a life.

I'm that poor, last week I got mugged and had £10 given

I got rid of my last 'plastic' card in 1992, I would lie if I said I do not have a bank account - I do - but in ten years it has never had more than a few dirhams in it, it is entirely a means to 'cash' cheques that can't be cashed and the bank holds my money for ten days for the privilege of doing so. No problems.
If I want to do/buy anything, I can as long as I have the money in my pocket. If not - I do something else.
How do I post this? I pay €20 cash (if I have it), and I have unlimited access to the world for a month. If I don't, I have to live with myself until I do - access to the outside world is a luxury. No problem.
The pack of plastic cards is finally realising what I realised in 92. It is unreal to live on credit.

What we have just seen the end of is a financial bubble that has been building for between ten and twenty years, depending upon whom you listen to. The fun part was the long, two-decade party, when stocks went up and up and up, after which real estate went up and up and up. But now we've started on the not-fun part, which I don't need to describe because Reuters and CNN and other media outlets are describing it moment by moment.

What the world has been doing for twenty years has been comparable to building a bridge over an abyss, using tissue paper. The paper held up because we believed it would. Now we find an urgent need to cross the bridge to safety on the other side, and we've all gone out on the bridge at once, with predictable results. Welcome to reality.

I can't tell you how many alarming things I've seen over the years, but I'll make a start: The flood of credit cards that used to fill my mailbox (a sign that the lenders saw nothing wrong with preying on the gullible, because they saw huge profits in it), followed by the telemarketers who leave messages on my answering machine warning me that I have six thousand dollars in credit card debt (not even close to real figure, which is much smaller), or that I qualify for low-interest mortgage loans. There was also an era of home-equity loans, which more or less coincided with balloon-payment loans for real estate. In my part of the country, we became used to the idea that houses were always cost ridiculous amounts of money, and would continue to get more expensive. If I told anyone that the trees don't grow to the sky, they wouldn't believe me anyway. Before long, I will meet disbelief if I tell anyone that stocks and home prices will eventually bottom out.

The greed of the few penalises the many

no quoteI just thought of it

Someone is going to pick up the bill, and that someone is the taxpayer, whose image you can see by looking in that mirror over there---->

Hint: the net effect of deficit spending is inflation.

catch 22 - heads we lose - tails we loseone of life's little jokes to the common man

The common man (whom I respect a lot, by the way) usually gets better at the things he practices the most. He learns what his limitations are, because no one is bashful about pointing them out to him. It's the ones with uncommon talents that I worry about, because when they make mistakes (which will happen, simply by the law of averages), the mistakes might be big ones, and drag a lot of other people down as well. Plus, you may have trouble telling the one who erred that what he did was a mistake. "I'm too smart to make mistakes" would be his response, in effect. And fuhgeddaboudit when these people become high government officials. But they're insulated from ruin by the comfortable pensions they will get after they retire from office--or the handsome fees they'll earn for serving on the boards of big corporations.

fully agree,I had a father who was never wrong in his entire life

How about your other fathers? What were they like?

Sounds like they were exactly the same. Sorry about that, old chap.

no apology needed mate - humour is humour and MY LIFE

Hi Jab, I hadn't seen this thread yet when I started moaning about the economy on your other thread. Feel free to answer my comments here if it is more appropriate.

people keep saying communism has failed. they may be right. but then what hasn't? millions of people are unemployed, homeless, even starving to death - can we still claim capitalism is the answer?

From JEllen on the CERN thread:

"Interesting subjects: mental health, and the economy. Both on my mind. I'm losing money hand over fist at the moment; money I'm supposed to be living on in the distant future. *sigh* The money I get for disability is a tiny amount, not enough to live on. This financial crisis had better stabilize soon."

This shows that
(a) It's not just bankers. We're all suffering, and the sooner the system works to provide inter-bank lending and therefore a working economy and therefore businesses/jobs getting some working money, and also people on benefits and people with savings - and pension schemes with shares get some help the better. We're all suffering and it needs to end fast.

(b)Ideological jousting or political point-scoring or even point-scoring on h2g2 (not that I'ved noticed any) are not what's needed in such an emergency, but quick, practical moves that work'

(c) I repeat, it's not just a jolly game against the rich. Ask JEllen and millions of others (including me). We are all in this, even if some of us don't realise it yet.

Jab

I think in my case, Jab, the effect will be delayed, because I have enough money for immediate needs. The problems will come in the future for me. But no one knows exactly what the future will bring, and at least I have family to help me ride it out.