During World War I, Americans were exhorted to buy Liberty Bonds to help their soldiers on the front.
Now, it seems, they will be asked to come to the aid of their banks ”” with the added inducement of possibly making some money for themselves.
As part of its sweeping plan to purge banks of troublesome assets, the Obama administration is encouraging several large investment companies to create the financial-crisis equivalent of war bonds: bailout funds.
Our forefathers bought war bonds to help pay for the effort to defeat the Nazis. Today, every man, woman and child would have have to buy $11,500 bond to pay offset just this year’s budget deficit of $3.5 trillion (and do it again and again for years to come). For what purpose? To assure that bankers who made a fortune making bad loans can for the most part continue in their high paying jobs?
Here is some interesting [url=http://www.bolling.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123060073]perspective[/url]:
[blockquote]
The War Finance Committee, in charge of the bond drives, sold more than $185 billion in these securities. By the end of World War II, more than 85 million Americans had invested in war bonds as part of the Payroll Savings Plan. That breaks down to an average of more than $2,100 per American in 1942 dollars. In today’s currency, that would equal approximately $24,000 per American (for 85 million citizens).With today’s population of more than 293 million Americans, every man, woman and child would have to contribute approximately $6,900 each to equal that output. The success of this innovative method of financing a war has not been matched since. [/blockquote]
Looks like another good way to drain the private sector of capital.