Saturday, February 28, 2009

Devaluation in the works?


In watching the TV reports of the US budget along with all the commentary and analysis I was suddenly stuck by an odd realization: This year is two thousand nine, next year is twenty-ten. What happened to the other one thousand nine hundred and eighty (2000 less 20)?

I realize that this is an acceptable alternative way of speaking about the year, but still it strikes me a bit odd that for the first 9 years of this centry we used one form and then in the 10th year we switch to another. Is there any rational explanation for this?

There's another thing that occurred to me in mulling this over. Maybe, this is the way the politicians plan to deal with the massive debt and deficits which the US government is running and planning. Divide a trillion by 100 and it becomes 10 billion. Doesn't sound quite as bad, does it?

Is the US dollar going to be devalued during the Obama administration?