It is the month of June, in the high country of central Mexico, near a lake, there is a little town small, quaint and charming.....
It is raining and the little town looks totally deserted.
It is tough times, everybody is in debt and everybody lives on credit. Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town.
He enters the only hotel, lays a 500 Peso bill on the reception counter, and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one.
The hotel proprietor takes the 500 Peso bill and runs to pay his debt to the butcher.
The Butcher takes the 500 Peso bill , and runs to pay his debt to the pig grower.
The pig grower takes the 500 Peso bill, and runs to pay his debt to the supplier of his feed and fuel.
The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 500 Peso bill note and runs to pay his debt to the town’s prostitute that in these hard times, gave her “services” on credit.
The hooker runs to the hotel, and pays off her debt with the 500 Peso bill to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she brought her clients there.
The hotel proprietor then lays the 500 Peso bill back on the counter so that the rich tourist will not suspect anything.
At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the rooms, and takes his 500 Pesos , after saying that he did not like any of the rooms, and leaves town.
No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism….
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the some governments do business as usual today and for the last couple of years...............
6 comments:
Hear hear! Why didn't I think of that? :)
That is a very, very good yarn.
That is wonderful! Now if only I was the kind who could remember them to retell at a later date...
Ah, so that's how economics works.
It's nice to know that I will be contributing in a such a big way to the local economy.
Last time I paid my hotel bill a day or so early, the owner had a big party that night.
What a great way to explain debt. That is a classic.
All ends well, except for the hotel keeper who has cleverly screwed himself. Since he starts with a $500 peso receivable from the prostitute, once the rich gringo leaves town, he has lost his $500 receivable due from the prostitute, and has no claim on the stranger. So he is actually worse off. Even if he had rented the room out, he'd still have lost the $500 peso receivable.
And rather ironic, that, since it was he who boldly started the chain.
So, again, there's no free lunch, even with a clever circle of receivables/debts.
It think this story is the textual equivalent of a shell game. The pea is there, you've just lost track of where.
Saludos,
Kim G
Boston, MA
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