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Zimbabwe introduces new $50 billion note
- ca98am79 18y agoman, my site is totally worthless now http://www.millionzimbabwedollarhomepage.com http://www.millionzimbabwedollarhomepage.com
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- opticksversi 18y agoZimbabwe (British-relative) national IQ: 66 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_IQ#National_IQ_and_QHC_values http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_IQ#National_IQ_and_QHC...
- tlrobinson 18y agoZimbabwe president: Robert Mugabe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mugabe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mugabe I'm pretty sure their government has much more to do with the hyperinflation.
- opticksversi 18y agoI'm pretty sure their government has ... to do with the hyperinflation. Indeed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_reform_in_Zimbabwe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_reform_in_Zimbabwe Land reform in Zimbabwe began after the signing of the Lancaster House Agreement in 1979 in an effort to more equitably distribute land between ... blacks and the minority-whites who ruled Zimbabwe from 1923 to 1979. . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_reform_in_Zimbabwe#Economic_consequences http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_reform_in_Zimbabwe#Economi... The results of the post-2000 land reform have been disastrous for the economy of Zimbabwe. Prior to land redistribution, land-owning farmers, mostly white, had large tracts of land and utilized economies of scale to raise capital, borrow money when necessary, and purchase modern mechanised farm equipment to increase productivity on their land. The reforms broke this land into smaller tracts (thereby destroying the economies of scale) and gave it to former black farmworkers and peasants
- mynameishere 18y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Man http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Man Not really a theory in the best repute.
- acangiano 18y agoThat tells you more about the inadequacy and bias of the IQ system in measuring and representing intelligence, than it tells you about African people.
- quantumhobbit 18y agoI might be feeding a troll here(2 day old account - http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=opticksversi http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=opticksversi ) but IQ is more a measure of a nations current economic development than something inherent in the population. See the Flynn Effect - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect
- opticksversi 18y agoIQ is more a measure of a nations current economic development than something inherent in the population. If that were the case, what would explain the outliers -- high-IQ nations that are poor, and low-IQ nations that are rich?
- electromagnetic 18y ago"what would explain the outliers" Precisely that, they're outliers. There's fully grown human beings that weigh 60lbs and ones that weigh almost 1000, it's not normal it just exists because there's 6 billion of us on the planet. There's hundreds of countries, so obviously not every single one will follow due to statistics.
- homme 18y agoYou are feeding a troll, a deaded account whose link style, phrasing, and thoughtprints betray him, however: http://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=DabAsteroid http://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=DabAsteroid
- opticksversi 18y agothe inadequacy and bias of the IQ system in measuring and representing intelligence Why do you believe there is inadequacy and bias in mental ability testing (the IQ system, as you put it)? Have you read this Citation Classic on the subject?: http://www.amazon.com/Bias-Mental-Testing-Arthur-Jensen/dp/0029164303 http://www.amazon.com/Bias-Mental-Testing-Arthur-Jensen/dp/0...
- sdfx 18y agoWhat a strange attempt to solve their problems. Maybe there is something wrong with your system if you can't print money fast enough to keep up with inflation.
- iigs 18y agoIn August last year, the RBZ slashed ten zeros from the currency. But the zeroes have bounced back with more vigor. That means in before August 2008 these would have been 500,000,000,000,000,000,000 notes. Yikes.
- quantumhobbit 18y agoWhen will they start using scientific notation on the notes? I'd invest a few dollars at whatever exchange rate just to get a hold of some $10^23 notes.
- LogicHoleFlaw 18y agoThat'd be just about a mole of currency. Yikes.
- mhartl 18y agoIt would be simpler just to switch to a log scale.
- wheels 18y agoIt's amazing how thoroughly has been completely destroyed in the last decade. What I think most first-world readers miss is that Zimbabwe is not one of those (previously) ultra-poor, undeveloped countries -- it's had a frighteningly long fall to get to where it is now.
- dcurtis 18y agoYeah, it used to be considered a model African country, with the highest increases in standard of living year/year of any country in the world. Robert Mugabe destroyed Zimbabwe. Wikipedia has some really excellent further reading on Mugabe and Zimbabwe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mugabe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mugabe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimbabwe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimbabwe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Zimbabwe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Zimbabwe
- jwilliams 18y agoIIRC, before Land Reform Zimbabwe was the only African country with a net surplus of food. Zim used to be called the bread basket of Africa. Putting aside the ideology of Land Reform (that's a whole other minefield of a topic), the execution and economic policies have been woeful. Another post quoted one issue which was that large tracts of land were broken up, which broke economies of scale. However, it was flawed in a lot of other ways. The original owners of the land were highly captialised. The people receiving the land often had no experience in cultivation, and even if they did, they had zero capital. They couldn't buy seed, machinery, expertise. The money and expertise required to turn this around pretty much fled the country. So large farms that produced vast quantities got broken up into small farms that produce almost nothing. At one stage Zim was in talks with China to have Chinese workers come over and work the land. I don't think that ever came to be, but China is a big player in Zimbabwe still - a lot of tourism, aid, weapons and immigration (several million?) comes from China.
- wheels 18y agoFrom what I've heard the land distribution was even worse than that -- farms were more often than not given to party hacks rather than poor farmers. The problem seems to largely have been that the land reform wasn't actually an act for social justice so much as a populist political move. Egypt's attempt at land reform seemed much better planned: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_land_reform#Law_Number_178 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_land_reform#Law_Number...
- vaksel 18y agoHow can an economy survive with such an inflation? How can you work, knowing that the salary you agreed to at the beginning of the day, is now worth 10 times less
- DougBTX 18y agoAt 80% unemployment, I guess they don't.
- quantumhobbit 18y agoI'd imagine a sort of barter system takes the place of the currency. You could also try to rely on foreign currencies.
- jwilliams 18y agoThey actively crack down on those using foreign currency, it's actually illegal to use foreign currency for transactions there - although of course everyone does and there is a massive black market for this. Mugabe also tried to fix the price of common goods - e.g. Bread, Milk, etc.
- jwilliams 18y agoEdit: Hmm - Apparently this has changed and they allow foreign currency trading now.
- ii 18y agoSalary is in foreign currency. As everything else.
- mattmcknight 18y agoHello, gold. Mugabe can't inflate it unless he's a real alchemist. I wonder if the US could get into this sort of situation?
- eru 18y agoGold is somewhat impractical. Having access to a lot of foreign currencies (on the black market, if necessary) is a substitute.
- mattmaroon 18y agoDamn, just when I bought the $25 billion of eBay.
- quellhorst 18y agoYou can already see discontinued $100 billion notes for sale on ebay... 10 for $40
- callmeed 18y agoHow long until they have a trillion dollar bill like the one Castro stole from Homer?
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- kirubakaran 18y agohttp://preview.tinyurl.com/ebay-100B http://preview.tinyurl.com/ebay-100B There seems to be $100B note. What am I missing?
- ckinnan 18y agoThe world badly needs a hard currency that is independent of political control.
- mixmax 18y agoKeep dreaming..
- iamnotwhite 18y agoThe tragedy of Zimbabwe is that a functioning, wealth-creating capitalist system that was evolving towards equal rights for blacks over time was sacrificed to satisfy the ego of a strong man, who proceeded to wipe out every trace of capitalism and rule of law, and replaced it with the law of the jungle. Zimbabwe's whites mostly left, so it is the black population that paid the biggest most terrible price. Naipaul has chronicled this process in his books very well. As a member of an once "inferior" race, I can state with confidence that we were not inferior, we were just behind in adopting the institutions and cultural patterns of modernity. The whites were teaching us that - by example that we could watch and emulate every day. A gradual process of assimilating those values would have served us well. Kicking the whites out took that opportunity away. Yes, none of this politically correct. That doesn't make any of it wrong either. Yes, there are white racists. Fuck them - they could not have stopped us from learning. Only we could have, and we did.
- birdseyeview 18y agoAre you sure you are not white? Or at least,...antipc? http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=411138 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=411138 And you and I both know who he really is, don't we, longtimer? [EDIT: Rechecked your facebook page. Yep, still white.]
- jpcx01 18y agoThere's a lesson to be learnt here. Printing money = Inflation. I know it seems obvious, but the Federal Reserve has printed about 800 billion dollars so far, and if our government ends up with a 2 trillion dollar deficit in the next few years, we're going to be seeing the same phenomenon. It wasn't that long ago (1970s) where inflation in US was 10-15%. Our population has short memories, and we seem doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past (vast government spending relative to revenue).
- somnambulist 18y agoCourtesy: Robert Mugabe!!!!! This is what this idiot is capable of, after all!!!!!
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- robak 18y agoRead it very carefully. This is USA in the future. 800 bilion bail-out - printed, over 1 trillion budget deficit - printed, another 800 billion bail out - printed. Only 5% of all the US dollars ever created is in circulation in the US. Rest of them are deposited in banks of the rest of the world as I.O.U.s... treasuries (us gov debt) that was bought by foreigners. The very moment foreigners realize that Treasuries have negative R.O.I. - as it will become true once treasuries bubble bursts and Fed starts printing to pay them off... well, this is how the whole Communistic Block collapsed in matter of months - hyperinflation due to inability of repaying debts. The exactly same thing will happen with the USA. Nation with no production, no savings and the biggest debt in the history of the man-kind... this country is going bankrupt. Kaput!
- abalashov 18y agoThe interesting thing is that there is probably considerable potential for the population of Zimbabwe to earn foreign hard currency by selling bank notes of this kind of denomination (for example, on eBay, if possible) simply because so many Westerners would find it incredibly novel to obtain one, just for the sheer amazement factor. It's an economic opportunity to take advantage of just how bewildering the situation is.