The spectre of the 2008 Financial Meltdown still looms heavy on the world nine years on as Italy was forced to bail out two more banks for 5.2 bn Euros.
The ‘toxic debt’ created by banks (trading debt and creating confidence with promises of huge profits), which debtors were unable to pay, resulted in major financial corporations collapsing or being bailed out by governments.
Then until now, millions of people lost their homes, lost their savings, lost their dignity; while the banking industry were merely slapped on the wrist with additional regulations. As for Italy, it is saddled with bad loans worth about 350bn Euros – a third of the Eurozone total bad debt. Italians and those with savings in the Italian banking system are extremely nervous and rightly so.
And the real criminal, i.e. the capitalist economic system itself, is constantly nursed by institutions, governments and capitalists to carry on wreaking havoc, as people are being lured into more consumerism and debt.
Total debt in the US by the first quarter of 2017 reached a staggering $12.73 trillion; homeless and food banks have grown; gross wealth inequality continues – and this is just in the developed world. Imagine the misery and exploitation in the developing world.
The capitalist economic system is nothing more than a web, flimsy but catching the unsuspecting (in their millions) and sucking them dry for the benefit of a few.
Unsurprising then that people are in constant search for a just economic system, one that:
• Has a currency that has intrinsic value and insulated against manipulation;
• Does not tax income;
• Circulates wealth into the economy such there is real trickle down;
• Does not weigh people down with usurious debt;
• Trades in the real economy;
• And allocates ownership such that resources, which belong to society, are not left in the greedy hands of private companies.
Well, that just alternative would be Islam then.
