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Thursday, December 23, 2010
So, what does it mean when a (local, state, federal) government runs completely out of money ?
Posted by kotang at 8:16 PMLet's look at a case in point. Prichard, Alabama is broke; it's economy collapsed after the boom years passed. Now, pensioners who paid into the pension fund aren't getting checks; they are suffering and hurting...
But Prichard's solution was the only solution...
There's a solution for this shameful calamity, you know.
Prichard needs a gen-u-ine U.S.0A. money printing press of it's own.
Just like the shiny ones working overtime at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C. and Fort Worth, Texas. Just allow Prichard a small press, to print the new $100 note and pass sufficient quantity along to it's suffering pensioners. Maybe a few notes kicked out extra to current employees (because we CARE!), and don't forget a few more printed for the schools and the city library. Hell, a few million new bills and the town of Prichard could become an attraction to homeless people from all across Alabama, then Florida, Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, necessitating more public facilities and more public food distribution and a new, bigger jail and new...more...better...
And why stop with Prichard? Just give these money printing presses to every city and state in the nation. No one, no where, need ever be broke and needy again!
IT'S FOR THE CHILDREN, DAMMIT ~!!!11!1!11!!!
And if we don't print new monies for Prichard? If this spreads to other, larger cities, states? What then?
Prichard did something that pension experts say they have never seen before: it stopped sending monthly pension checks to its 150 retired workers, breaking a state law requiring it to pay its promised retirement benefits in full.Bad, terrible things happen when the monies stop coming in.
Since then, Nettie Banks, 68, a retired Prichard police and fire dispatcher, has filed for bankruptcy. Alfred Arnold, a 66-year-old retired fire captain, has gone back to work as a shopping mall security guard to try to keep his house. Eddie Ragland, 59, a retired police captain, accepted help from colleagues, bake sales and collection jars after he was shot by a robber, leaving him badly wounded and unable to get to his new job as a police officer at the regional airport.
Far worse was the retired fire marshal who died in June. Like many of the others, he was too young to collect Social Security. “When they found him, he had no electricity and no running water in his house,” said David Anders, 58, a retired district fire chief. “He was a proud enough man that he wouldn’t accept help.”
But Prichard's solution was the only solution...
So the declining, little-known city of Prichard is now attracting the attention of bankruptcy lawyers, labor leaders, municipal credit analysts and local officials from across the country. They want to see if the situation in Prichard, like the continuing bankruptcy of Vallejo, Calif., ultimately creates a legal precedent on whether distressed cities can legally cut or reduce their pensions, and if so, how.Is there no way for Prichard to re-start these benefits? Why is there no money to give to these pensioners?
“Prichard is the future,” said Michael Aguirre, the former San Diego city attorney, who has called for San Diego to declare bankruptcy and restructure its own outsize pension obligations. “We’re all on the same conveyor belt. Prichard is just a little further down the road.”
A lawyer representing the city, R. Scott Williams, said that the city simply did not have the money. “The reality for Prichard is that if you took money to build the pension up, who’s going to pay the garbage man?” he asked. “Who’s going to pay to run the police department? Who’s going to pay the bill for the street lights? There’s only so much money to go around.”Who, indeed. Where are the EVIL RICH when you need 'em?
There's a solution for this shameful calamity, you know.
Prichard needs a gen-u-ine U.S.0A. money printing press of it's own.
Just like the shiny ones working overtime at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C. and Fort Worth, Texas. Just allow Prichard a small press, to print the new $100 note and pass sufficient quantity along to it's suffering pensioners. Maybe a few notes kicked out extra to current employees (because we CARE!), and don't forget a few more printed for the schools and the city library. Hell, a few million new bills and the town of Prichard could become an attraction to homeless people from all across Alabama, then Florida, Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, necessitating more public facilities and more public food distribution and a new, bigger jail and new...more...better...
And why stop with Prichard? Just give these money printing presses to every city and state in the nation. No one, no where, need ever be broke and needy again!
IT'S FOR THE CHILDREN, DAMMIT ~!!!11!1!11!!!
And if we don't print new monies for Prichard? If this spreads to other, larger cities, states? What then?
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