Quote of the day: Clive James on the world economic crisis

“In view of the magnitude of the current world economic crisis, I still haven’t dared ring the bank to find out if I’m still solvent. . . . As I understand it, which is to the minimum extent compatible with earning a living, there is nothing inherently wrong with a market economy. As long as people make money by making things, and then invest the profit in making more things, an economy can boom forever. Trouble starts when people start making money out of money itself. Then the whole deal comes tumbling down and finally lands on the less well-off, which at this rate might effectively mean everybody less well-off than the Sultan of Brunei.”