what happened in Iceland should be happening in america

Es­ti­mated reading time is 2 min­utes.

AFTER THE PRI­VA­TI­ZA­TION of Iceland’s banking sector, pri­vate bankers bor­rowed $3,500,000,000 in 2000. This was ten times the size of the tiny nation’s economy! This cre­ated an im­me­diate eco­nomic “bubble” that had two ef­fects: a few wealthy people be­came ex­ceed­ingly wealthy people, and it left Ice­land on the verge of bankruptcy.

The rest of the cit­i­zens were left with a debt to other na­tions that they could not pay. They did not take this lying dow, and swift, mean­ingful changes followed:

1. The cit­i­zens re­placed the old Ice­land gov­ern­ment with a new one.
2. The cit­i­zens na­tion­al­ized the main bank of Iceland.
3. The cit­i­zens voted to deny pay­ment of the debt cre­ated by the bankers.
4. The cit­i­zens held a
 con­sti­tu­tional as­sembly and rewrote their constitution.

The re­sult was the Or­gan­i­sa­tion for Eco­nomic Co-operation and De­vel­op­ment ex­pected Iceland’s economy to out­grow the euro and the av­erage for the de­vel­oped world! 1

Largest banking collapse in history

“The Ice­landic fi­nan­cial crisis was a major eco­nomic and po­lit­ical event in Ice­land that in­volved the de­fault of all three of the coun­try’s major pri­vately owned com­mer­cial banks in late 2008, fol­lowing their dif­fi­cul­ties in re­fi­nancing their short-term debt and a run on de­posits in the Nether­lands and the United Kingdom.

Rel­a­tive to the size of its economy, Ice­land’s sys­temic banking col­lapse was the largest ex­pe­ri­enced by any country in eco­nomic his­tory. The crisis led to a se­vere eco­nomic de­pres­sion in 2008–2010 and sig­nif­i­cant po­lit­ical un­rest.” (Wikipedia)

Today Iceland is thriving

“The prime min­ister was in­dicted, over 200 crim­inal charges were filed against the bankers, and all of the former CEOs of the three biggest banks were ar­rested. The new gov­ern­ment sup­ported cit­i­zens by passing a banking re­mit­tance that for­gave debt ex­ceeding 110% of home values.

As a re­sult, banks have for­given loans equiv­a­lent to 13% of gross do­mestic product, easing the debt bur­dens of more than a quarter of the pop­u­la­tion. Today Ice­land is thriving.

This story is much dif­ferent than what has hap­pened in the US since the banking crisis began in 2008. Large bailouts were granted to the bankers, and none of the re­spon­sible par­ties have faced crim­inal pros­e­cu­tion. And it ap­pears that we are still at the mercy of the cur­rency cartel and the dollar faces total de­struc­tion.” 2

What happened in Iceland

Re­garding the title of this piece, “What Hap­pened in Ice­land Should Be Hap­pening in America”: the hap­pened part refers to the eco­nomic bub­bles in­volving stupid or cor­rupt bankers that happen reg­u­larly in America, just like Iceland.

But what should be hap­pening in America is an up­rising of in­censed cit­i­zens who go after the rot­ters, change the gov­ern­ment, and make sure that wealthy crooks can’t do it again in the future.

But it won’t, be­cause we just don’t have what it takes, un­like the Icelanders . . .


Photo of protest in Reykjavik, Iceland, happening on November 15, 2008.

FEA­TURED IMAGE: The photo at the top of this page cap­tures some of the thou­sands of pro­testers in front of the Alþingishús, seat of the Ice­landic par­lia­ment, in Reyk­javik, Ice­land, on No­vember 15, 2008.


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FOOT­NOTES:

1   Adapted from the ar­ticle “The Power Of Peaceful Rev­o­lu­tion In Ice­land” on the Project Cen­sored web­site. It was a part of that site’s main ar­ticle, “Top 25 Cen­sored Sto­ries From 2012-2013.” 

2   From “Iceland’s Hördur Tor­fason – How to Beat the Banksters,” by Alex Pietrowski for Waking Times (De­cember 11, 2012).



 
 

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