I gave these as Christmas presents! They're still for sale on eBay 5 for $20 with free shipping! This is funny, but it's also very serious. The US is now engaged in the very practice that made Zimbabwe notes such a joke. Thanks for the post, Melbo.
Inflation rate in July 2008 = 231,150,888.87% We joke of wheelbarrows of money but it actually happened. Check this out:
Look out, Melbo - my chickens laid 11 eggs this morning. I'll be a trillionaire too, by the end of the weekend! (I might have skipped that .87 and rounded the inflation rate up, but that's just me.)
Paper and ink must not cost much there because the sheer volume is worth much more here than the product being purchased there. Something doesn't smell right.
I think that's why they started adding all those zeros to the Notes. The carry trade was getting out of hand.
UPDATE: I'm a trillionaire now, too, and that's after we ate 266 billion worth of eggs for breakfast!
Mugabe has turned that country even more into a stye. The government there does nothing to stop the continuing MASSIVE inflation there, and it only hurts the people. They need to completely overhaul their financial system. What is left of it anyway.
They're in this pickle because they monetized the debt. In plain english, that means the cenral bank created the money out of thin air to finance the government's treasury paper. They HAD to do that because no one else would buy the junk. Here in America they're doing the exact same thing. Last year, the Federal Reserve bought 80% of all treasuries sold. It's Zimbabwe on the Potomac - featuring Ben Bernanke as Gideon Gono!
