Location: Bloomberg.com Web site

I need a parachute today!  The DOW, as seen on the constantly updated graph from Bloomberg’s site, is palpitating like a heart about to go into cardiac arrest.

Elizabeth Stanton, reporting for Bloomberg.com, noted earlier today about the tumble in stocks in the States, Europe, and Asia:

The declines following yesterday’s holiday added to a sell- off across Europe and Asia that has erased $7.3 trillion in global stock-market value this year. Exxon Mobil Corp., the largest oil company, and Barrick Gold Corp., the biggest gold producer, fell on lower crude and metal prices. Bank of America Corp. posted its steepest decline since 2003 after the second- largest U.S. bank said earnings dropped 95 percent.

In the interest of my students from “Invented Worlds,“ I have to ask myself…7.3 trillion in WHAT?  What does that “value” mean?

The world economy is no longer under underwritten (probably never was) by precious metals in vaults.  It is underwritten by trust between parties and faith that no one will cash in all their chips at one time.

In fact, the basis of much economic activity is the selling of US Treasury notes…all that debt we have piled while cutting taxes as the government fights a multi-front war and keeps writing IOUs. US consumers, in debt themselves, were too busy buying plastic trash cans, musical bottle openers, and Tickle-Me-Elmos from China and super-sizing their homes and SUVs to notice that everything was a bit…unreal.

Whatever the reality of the money in this crazy system, the effects on investors are real enough.  That’s why I put Iggy in a parachute for the snap I’ve included.

I am glad that most modern financial buildings do not have windows that can open…I just hope that the people in those offices realize that losing one’s wealth is not the same as losing one’s life.

Get a parachute.  Incidentally, it seems only the smallest of economic blips to report here (unverified) that NPR covered a decline in economic activity and usage of Second Life. 

Loss of economic activity in a shared illusion part of a larger illusion? Today, people are concerned about the stability of a multi-trillion-dollar illusion. I wish them all luck.

Where’s my parachute?

Be sure to check the “In a Strange Land” Archive for old posts

 

No comments have been posted.

Post Your Comments:

Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.