Forgive us if you’ve heard this before but we find it amusing in the current debate about ‘Helicopter Money’ and ‘Quantitative Easing’
A model to solve the EU crisis –
Greece owes it’s landlord €20 and can’t pay. One day Germany walks into the apartment building and says to the landlord “I’d quite like a room but I want to view it first” the landlord says “That’s fine you can go up and look but you must leave a €20 deposit on the counter whilst you go up” Germany says fine and leaves the deposit and goes upstairs.
France wanders through the lobby and sees the €20 and picks it up, “just enough to pay the lady of the night the money I owe her” so he takes the money and gives it to Italy. Italy owes the landlord €20 so she leaves him the money and goes on her way happy that the debt is paid. Germany meanwhile comes back down and decides that they don’t really like the room so picks up the €20 and leaves.
Greece does not owe the landlord, France and Italy’s debts are paid and Germany still has the €20 so every one is happy right?