The current banking crisis explained:Young Thomas bought a donkey from a farmer for £100. The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next day.
The next day he drove up and said, 'Sorry son, but I have some bad news. The donkey died.'
Thomas replied, 'Well then just give me my money back.' The farmer said, 'Can't do that. I've already spent it.'
Thomas said, 'OK, then, just bring me the dead donkey.' The farmer asked, 'What are you going to do with him?'
Thomas said, 'I'm going to raffle him off.' The farmer said, 'You can't raffle a dead donkey!'
Thomas said, 'Sure I can. Watch me.. I just won't tell anybody he's dead.'
A month later, the farmer met up with Thomas and asked, 'What happened with that dead donkey?'
Thomas said, 'I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two pounds a piece and made a profit of £898'
The farmer said, 'Didn't anyone complain?' Thomas said, 'Just the guy who won. So I gave him his two pounds back !'
Thomas then went to work for Barclays.
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Here this tale would have ended... but it didn't...
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A year later, Thomas (now working for HBOS / Halifax Bank Of Scotland), comes running into the farmer's yard, out of breath and looking frightened.
"You must help me hide!" cries Thomas.
The farmer asks, "Why? What's wrong?"
Thomas explained, "I went all over the village, hiring people to sell raffle tickets for the same dead donkey, and then those people hired other people to go to other villages and sell raffle tickets for the same dead donkey, and now there are thousands of raffles taking place all over the kingdom.
Millions of people and pension funds bought my raffle tickets, but the donkey started to stink and everybody found out it was dead, so now they want their raffle ticket money back!"
The farmer suggested, "Just pay back the money, Thomas."
"I can't!" Thomas moaned. "I spent it all on bonuses for my raffle salespeople, and private jets, and huge mansions, and an opulent lifestyle to which we, in the raffle ticket business, have become accustomed. Not only that, I borrowed against my raffle ticket earnings 35 fold, so now I OWE 35 TIMES the money I actually earned!"
The farmer thought a moment, then smiled. "Don't worry, Thomas. I know what to do."
Thomas asked, "What can possibly be done?"
The farmer answered, "Your raffle operation is the biggest business in all the land. It's too big to fail. The King will bail you out, for the good of all his loyal subjects."
And with that, Thomas beseeched the King for billions of pounds to create the R.T.R.P. (Raffle Ticket Relief Program) to buy back all the worthless raffle tickets.
Everybody thought that would be the end of it, but it turns out the King didn't have enough money to bail out the Raffle ticket holders, so he issued official "Raffle Bonds" to borrow money from other lands.
Everybody thought THAT would be the end of it, except when the rulers of other lands figured out their lent money was being spent on dead donkey raffle tickets, they stopped lending it. So the King decided to just print the money to buy back the dead donkey raffle tickets.
Everybody thought THAT would be the end of it, until it turns out that printing money causes each individual pound to be worth much less, so prices for goods and services rose enormously throughout the kingdom. The King decided to issue a new paper currency denominated at 1/10th the face value of the old pounds, and forced everyone to exchange their old money for new money so prices would come down to normal again.
Everybody thought THAT would be the end of it, until the same thing happened with the new currency, so the people rose up and toppled the King with torches and pitchforks, and installed a new ruling government with a new currency backed by gold.
And THEN they all lived happily ever after.
The End.
Modified from the Source: http://www.linkydinky.com/Donkey_raffle.shtml
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