Book Review - Debt: The First 5,000 Years

Early this year, I read a book called "Debt: The First 5,000 Years". It has been nothing short of a "viewquake" for me...I wish I'd read it much sooner. I guess late is better than never.

It has been stewing in my mind ever since, and brought back to the forefront of my mind many answered questions I've had since late 2008.

I've never forgotten when they first started bailing out the banks during my junior year in high school. I felt in my soul that it was deeply wrong, and I knew that something was terribly wrong with our society. It made me fascinated with economics, and is one of the chief reasons I majored in it during college.

Estimates vary widely, but the total size of the bailouts was in the trillions of dollars, if not tens of trillions. I don't think anyone knows the true size of the bailouts, and I think that is a deliberate choice by our policymakers, corporations, and media. For context, the total amount of all student loan debt is only $1.5 trillion in 2018. All US home mortgage debt is less than $10 trillion.

We are nearly 10 years out from the crisis and nothing has been resolved. No one who caused the crisis has been held to account.

The rule we all learned back then was that we, the people, must pay our debts, but not the banks.

I have this sense that we are on the cusp of finally getting answers, that we are at the beginning of an epochal change in the way our financial system and government are structured and operate.

I've come to the conclusion that reality is stranger than fiction. I am a mix of nervous, scared, but ultimately very excited for what comes next. I am optimistic that we can break free of our collective mental prisons and solve the grand challenges of our time.

Originally posted on Facebook on August 8, 2018:
https://www.facebook.com/thepner1/posts/pfbid02nq28xX66GYEwE4YXF595vYTHvhYm6C7knLdjibRA6EQvYtQerD8Ghc9uKmsiGm84l