WEBVTT - 9 Wallet-Busting Facts About Debt 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:17.880 You're listening to part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope 0:00:18.040 --> 0:00:25.639 and iHeartRadio. Yuess what, well, what's that mango? Do you 0:00:25.680 --> 0:00:27.800 know that people in medieval England used to pay their 0:00:27.840 --> 0:00:30.720 rent with eels? I don't know why anyone would want 0:00:30.840 --> 0:00:33.839 multiple eels, much less accept them as a form of payment. 0:00:33.920 --> 0:00:34.800 What is this all about? 0:00:34.880 --> 0:00:37.880 Well, this was back before coins were widely available, when 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:40.960 most people just settle their debts with in kind payments. 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:44.360 They usually traded things like eggs or corn or ale, 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:49.040 but one of the most highly prized tender was smoked eels, 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:53.040 and the long snakelike fish was super plentiful in British 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:55.600 rivers back then, so for a stretch of about five 0:00:55.680 --> 0:00:59.000 hundred years they were caught and traded as makeshift currency, 0:00:59.120 --> 0:01:01.840 and in fact, by the end of the eleventh century, 0:01:02.160 --> 0:01:04.680 more than half a million eels were being paid as 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.800 rent in England each year, specifically and rent so that 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:08.680 you get the first. 0:01:08.480 --> 0:01:10.120 Of the month and you could just send your landlord 0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:12.120 a sack of dead eels and they wouldn't kick you 0:01:12.160 --> 0:01:12.720 out of your place. 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:15.319 More than that, they would be thrilled about it, because 0:01:15.400 --> 0:01:18.640 eels were a tasty and nutritious food source, and they 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:21.679 were especially nice to have on hand during Lent, which 0:01:21.720 --> 0:01:24.920 is when practicing Catholics would abstained from eating meat. But 0:01:25.160 --> 0:01:27.839 if a landlord didn't want to eat all of their earnings, 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:29.880 they could always just use the eels to pay their 0:01:29.880 --> 0:01:33.240 own debts instead, and the fish were desirable enough that 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:35.440 just about anyone would accept them as payment. 0:01:36.040 --> 0:01:38.480 I do imagine the turnaround time has to be pretty 0:01:38.520 --> 0:01:40.600 quick on these, right, Like, I'm not sure what the 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:42.360 shelf life is for eel. 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:45.640 I mean that is true, but in most cases the 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:48.480 fish would be salted and smoked and dried so that 0:01:48.520 --> 0:01:51.120 they could be swapped around and stored more easily, and 0:01:51.200 --> 0:01:54.640 for added portability, they were typically tied together into bundles 0:01:54.680 --> 0:01:58.240 of sticks or twenty five eels apiece. 0:01:58.440 --> 0:01:59.840 You know, this really does feel like one of those 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:02.560 that's just too weird to be true. 0:02:02.760 --> 0:02:05.240 I mean, Gabe showed me all kinds of written records 0:02:05.280 --> 0:02:08.440 to back it up. For example, one of the highest 0:02:08.480 --> 0:02:11.000 eel rents that we know came from the village of 0:02:11.040 --> 0:02:15.160 Harmston in Lincolnshire, and according to the town ledger, the 0:02:15.200 --> 0:02:18.560 residents owed the Earl Hugh of Chester seventy five thousand 0:02:18.600 --> 0:02:21.040 eels per year for use of his land. 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:23.800 It's a lot of eels where I don't know, maybe not, 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:25.240 I don't really have a reference point. 0:02:25.760 --> 0:02:28.480 Yeah, it feels like one eel is too many eels 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:32.280 to me. But I love the idea of briefcases full 0:02:32.280 --> 0:02:34.720 of eels that you're just dropping on your landlord store. 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:37.160 You know, we were trying to figure out the conversion 0:02:37.240 --> 0:02:39.320 rate for something like this, like how much was a 0:02:39.360 --> 0:02:42.400 single eel or a stick of eels worth? There is 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:44.840 no way to know for certain, but the lead historian 0:02:45.040 --> 0:02:48.560 on eel rents his name is doctor John Wyatt Greenley. 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:51.200 He came up with a pretty solid guests and based 0:02:51.240 --> 0:02:53.840 on the numbers found in medieval ledgers, he worked out 0:02:53.880 --> 0:02:56.760 that a single eel would be worth about forty three 0:02:56.800 --> 0:03:00.160 to eighty five cents in today's money. So if the 0:03:00.240 --> 0:03:02.760 upper end of that range, then the residents of Harmston 0:03:02.880 --> 0:03:06.679 were paying about sixty three grand in eel rent per year, 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:09.440 which isn't too bad for an entire village. 0:03:09.160 --> 0:03:11.800 I guess, I guess until you think about all the 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:14.359 work that had to go into harvesting and curing seventy 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:17.400 five thousand eels, Like that's a lot of extra labor 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:19.040 on top of your actual day job. 0:03:19.120 --> 0:03:21.720 Right, Yeah, it's kind of amazing the system held out 0:03:21.760 --> 0:03:25.120 as long as it did. Eel rents remained commonplace until 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:27.280 the fourteenth century or so. But it wasn't the hassle 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:30.160 of sourcing them that finally killed the practice. It was 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:34.440 the bubonic plague. So after England's population was decimated in 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:37.360 the mid thirteen hundreds, much of the empty farmland was 0:03:37.400 --> 0:03:41.120 repurposed for raising livestock, and once red meat became more 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:45.040 widely available, the demand for eels fell and disappeared almost 0:03:45.080 --> 0:03:48.440 completely by the year fifteen hundred. But that's just the 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:51.760 first of nine strange stories we're sharing today, all plucked 0:03:51.760 --> 0:03:55.000 from the debt ledgers of history. Let's dive in. 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.760 Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:21.200 Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good 0:04:21.200 --> 0:04:23.599 friend Mangesh Ticketter. And on the other side of that 0:04:23.720 --> 0:04:26.039 soundproof glass wearing a green visor. 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:28.000 And this is a beautiful green visor. 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:30.920 Cranking away on an antique adding machine. That's our friend 0:04:30.960 --> 0:04:33.760 and producer Dylan Fagan. Now I don't know what kinds 0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:36.000 of numbers he's crunching over there, but he is crunching 0:04:36.040 --> 0:04:36.960 them up fast. 0:04:36.720 --> 0:04:39.760 Mega, moving so fast. I think he's just pushing random buttons. 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:41.400 I think so, but he looks like he knows what 0:04:41.440 --> 0:04:44.359 he's doing. But all right, Well, since today's episode is 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:46.480 all about the history of debt, I thought it'd be 0:04:46.520 --> 0:04:49.000 fun to trace the concept back to its source and 0:04:49.080 --> 0:04:52.240 find out where and when the first debt was actually 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:52.880 racked up. 0:04:53.000 --> 0:04:54.560 I love it, so did you figure it out? 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:55.160 I did not. 0:04:55.480 --> 0:04:58.000 So it turns out there's just no way to pinpoint 0:04:58.000 --> 0:05:00.760 it with any real degree of accuracy. And that's because 0:05:00.800 --> 0:05:03.520 debt is as old as history itself. So as soon 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:06.840 as humans began putting pen to paper or wedge to tablet, like, 0:05:06.880 --> 0:05:10.880 we started keeping track of things like storehouse inventories or 0:05:10.920 --> 0:05:14.400 bills of sale private loans. Even in fact, the earliest 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:17.800 known examples of writing come from Mesopotamia. This was about 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:20.600 five thousand years ago, and they aren't works of poetry 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:21.080 or fiction. 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:23.359 They're actually bookkeeping. 0:05:23.080 --> 0:05:26.240 Which is not nearly as romantic as it feels like it. 0:05:26.279 --> 0:05:27.400 H It doesn't. 0:05:27.520 --> 0:05:30.840 But you know, there is surprisingly a sweet side to this, 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:34.360 because these tablets didn't just log the accumulation of debts. 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:38.400 They also tracked its cancelation. So there's evidence of wide 0:05:38.400 --> 0:05:41.760 scale debt cancelations in Mesopotamia as far back as twenty 0:05:41.760 --> 0:05:45.680 four hundred BCE, and the practice continued there periodically for 0:05:45.720 --> 0:05:46.680 about a thousand years. 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:50.080 So what kind of debt was being canceled? Like, is 0:05:50.120 --> 0:05:52.280 this private debt? Is it national debt? 0:05:52.920 --> 0:05:56.200 Well, actually, the concept of national debt or public debt 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:58.400 is is really much more of a modern invention than 0:05:58.440 --> 0:05:59.080 you might think. 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:00.240 So in the ancient. 0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:03.240 World, all debt was private debt and this is how 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:06.120 it worked. So in agrarian societies, the state would provide 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:09.919 the peasantry with farmland, tools, livestock, and of course water 0:06:10.000 --> 0:06:12.880 for irrigation, and at harvest time a portion of the 0:06:12.880 --> 0:06:16.440 food they produced would be paid to the state as rent. Unfortunately, 0:06:16.440 --> 0:06:19.440 when a harvest was worse than expected, the peasants had 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.080 to secure private loans from the upper class in order 0:06:22.120 --> 0:06:24.799 to feed themselves and pay the state what they owed, 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:28.159 which of course led to an accumulation of debt, and 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:30.840 if the borrower wasn't able to pay it off in time, 0:06:30.960 --> 0:06:33.719 then either they or their family members would be enslaved 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:37.080 by their creditors. Now, obviously this wasn't a great system, 0:06:37.120 --> 0:06:40.400 because over time, more and more people were becoming slaves 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:41.440 to their fellow citizens. 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:44.560 Yeah, which is not a great recipe for a healthy society. 0:06:44.839 --> 0:06:45.400 Not so much. 0:06:45.480 --> 0:06:48.320 And that's why it became customary for the state to 0:06:48.400 --> 0:06:51.679 wipe the slate clean every few years. This typically happened 0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:54.920 during a big public festival in the springtime. The sitting 0:06:55.000 --> 0:06:58.159 sovereign would proclaim that everyone's debt was erased, and any 0:06:58.200 --> 0:07:01.160 peasants who had been enslaved for unpaid bills were restored 0:07:01.200 --> 0:07:02.400 their full citizenship. 0:07:03.000 --> 0:07:05.440 That's pretty amazing, But it sounds like this was a 0:07:06.320 --> 0:07:09.279 kind of a cyclical process, right, so after a few 0:07:09.279 --> 0:07:11.800 more lean harvests, a peasant might find themselves right back 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:12.600 in bondage again. 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:13.720 That's exactly right. 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:16.640 And it's clear from that on again, off again approach 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:19.800 that the rulers of Mesopotamia didn't oppose the practice on 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:23.120 moral grounds. The cancelations were actually away for them to 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:25.560 keep the peace and preserve the status quote, you know, 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:29.400 so that society wouldn't break down altogether. And on that count, 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:33.440 the debt cancelation system actually worked remarkably well, so well 0:07:33.440 --> 0:07:36.480 in fact, that it was eventually adopted by neighboring kingdoms, 0:07:36.640 --> 0:07:40.880 so you're thinking about places like Assyria, Egypt, Jerusalem, and 0:07:40.960 --> 0:07:43.840 Debt cancelation even became a core component of the Jewish 0:07:43.840 --> 0:07:46.840 faith as well as early Christianity. For instance, the Book 0:07:46.880 --> 0:07:50.000 of Leviticus calls on Christians to hold a quote year 0:07:50.040 --> 0:07:52.120 of jubilee every half century. 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:52.560 Now. 0:07:52.560 --> 0:07:55.480 This occasion is meant to correct any economic inequalities that 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:59.560 may have arisen over the years, wiping out long standing debts. 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:00.960 And offering families a fresh dart. 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:04.000 It's wild to think that was like such a common 0:08:04.120 --> 0:08:06.880 practice in the ancient world, because it it feels like 0:08:06.960 --> 0:08:10.119 such a difficult thing to push through today, like whenever 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:12.200 we talk about canceling college loans or things like that, 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:14.880 there's often so much political pushback. 0:08:15.000 --> 0:08:17.760 Yeah, no, for sure, And I haven't seen on anybody's 0:08:17.760 --> 0:08:20.720 calendar a year of jubilee coming up. But it actually 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:22.840 might be the perfect time to try it again, because 0:08:23.160 --> 0:08:26.800 according to a papal bull instituted by the late Pope Francis, 0:08:27.160 --> 0:08:28.920 the next jubilee year should. 0:08:28.720 --> 0:08:31.200 Be twenty twenty five, which is right now. 0:08:33.040 --> 0:08:35.040 I feel like my bank must have missed the memo 0:08:35.120 --> 0:08:37.480 on this, but I am glad you brought up debt 0:08:37.480 --> 0:08:40.640 forgiveness because there's at least one person who's taking the 0:08:40.720 --> 0:08:44.839 Jubilee year to heart, and that is Welsh actor Michael Sheen. 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:46.600 I did not see that one coming. 0:08:46.679 --> 0:08:49.080 So he's the guy who plays Tony Blair and all 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:50.720 those British docu dramas, right. 0:08:50.720 --> 0:08:54.040 Uh huh. And he's also played the broadcaster David Frost 0:08:54.080 --> 0:08:57.040 a few times too. But he's not keeping all that 0:08:57.080 --> 0:09:00.480 Blair Frost money to himself because earlier this year she 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:03.040 used his earnings to write off the debt of nearly 0:09:03.160 --> 0:09:06.120 nine hundred people in his hometown of Port Talbot, Wales. 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:08.640 And this is actually a story that our good friend 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:11.840 Simon Brewe told me about. But the decline of the 0:09:11.880 --> 0:09:15.160 city's steel industry had left many residents struggling for years, 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:18.680 you know, just to make ends meet, and after learning 0:09:18.720 --> 0:09:21.000 that many of his former neighbors were deep in debt 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:23.560 as a result of this, Sheen decided to lend a 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:26.720 hand by buying up a million pounds of their collective debt, 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:28.120 which he then canceled. 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:32.199 So the million pounds actually came out of his own pocket. Yeah, 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:35.600 but he definitely used his own money. That said, he 0:09:35.640 --> 0:09:38.480 didn't actually have to pay the full million, because by 0:09:38.520 --> 0:09:40.920 the time she stepped in, many of the residents' debt 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:43.640 had been bundled together by creditors and sold off to 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:46.440 debt buying companies, and this often happens at the lower price. 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:49.679 So after a lengthy process, the actor was able to 0:09:49.720 --> 0:09:52.120 set up his own debt buying company, and then he 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:55.840 acquired Port Talbot's debt for one tenth of its actual value. 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:58.199 All right, so he paid one hundred thousand pounds for 0:09:58.280 --> 0:10:00.000 a million pounds worth of debt. 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:01.400 How does that actually work? 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:04.040 So I yues. The other debt buying companies didn't think 0:10:04.080 --> 0:10:06.400 there was much of a chance of anyone actually collecting 0:10:06.400 --> 0:10:08.480 on that debt, so they were willing to sell the 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:12.560 rights for a much smaller lump sum. And in most cases, 0:10:12.600 --> 0:10:14.560 the residents would have still been on the hook for 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:17.640 the full amount they owed, but thanks to Sheen's generosity, 0:10:17.840 --> 0:10:19.679 now they don't have to pay back a single pound. 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:20.760 That is pretty amazing. 0:10:20.800 --> 0:10:24.040 That's really sweet. And if any listeners want to learn 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:27.120 more about Sheen's experience and his motivations for doing this 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:31.199 whole thing, Channel four produced a documentary chronicling the whole campaign. 0:10:31.360 --> 0:10:35.480 It is called Michael Sheen's Secret Million pound Giveaway, and 0:10:35.800 --> 0:10:38.320 the show makes the case for reforming the UK's credit 0:10:38.360 --> 0:10:41.040 industries so low income families won't have to resort to 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:42.440 high interest payday loans. 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:44.960 All right, Well, jumping back a bit further in time, 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:47.280 the next fact is about a guy who also paid 0:10:47.320 --> 0:10:50.080 off somebody else's hefty debts, but in this case the 0:10:50.120 --> 0:10:53.120 tab belonged to the US government. So this was back 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:56.600 in seventeen ninety five, about twelve years after the American Revolution, 0:10:57.160 --> 0:11:01.400 and despite Alexander Hamilton's best effort, the nation was struggling 0:11:01.440 --> 0:11:04.240 to pay off loans that it had taken from European 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:07.360 allies during the war. Now, the debt totaled over two 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:10.000 million dollars, which is more than fifty one and a 0:11:10.040 --> 0:11:13.200 half million dollars in today's money. And even though we 0:11:13.240 --> 0:11:15.880 owed all that money, the US was actually trying to 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:19.400 negotiate new loans along the way, which wasn't going over 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:22.160 that well with everybody in Europe. But that's where a 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:25.600 man named James Swan came in. So in seventeen ninety five, 0:11:25.640 --> 0:11:28.960 the Scottish American banker used his own money to privately 0:11:29.000 --> 0:11:32.199 assume the entire two million dollar debt that we owed 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:35.600 the French. This was hailed by many as a patriotic gesture, 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:38.880 and Swan was indeed a patriot. He actually took part 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:41.720 in the Boston Tea Party, was wounded not once but 0:11:41.840 --> 0:11:44.640 twice at the Battle of Bunker Hill. But taking over 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:48.040 the national debt wasn't a completely selfless act on his part. 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:50.679 In fact, he actually managed to turn a tidy profit 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:51.080 from it. 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:55.080 So he didn't go full Michael Sheen and cancel everyone's dead. 0:11:55.200 --> 0:11:56.640 No, no, no, he definitely didn't do that. 0:11:56.720 --> 0:12:00.560 Instead, Swan resold America's debts at a profit to domestic 0:12:00.600 --> 0:12:03.840 private investors. This meant that the US still had to 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:06.920 pay back the money eventually, but at least we didn't 0:12:06.960 --> 0:12:10.080 owe it to foreign governments, and so Swan's payoff helped 0:12:10.080 --> 0:12:13.000 the young nations say face on the world stage, also 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:15.800 convinced other countries that it was safe to keep lending 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:16.559 the US money. 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:19.000 That's pretty incredible, And it's strange to think about a 0:12:19.000 --> 0:12:21.880 banker bailing out the US government instead of the other 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.800 way around, right, right, right, Yeah, it's not typically the 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:27.680 way that goes. But all right, we've got five more 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:30.400 debt ridden stories left to share, but first let's take 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:48.280 a quick break. Welcome back to Part Time Genius, where 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:51.480 we're exploring the lighter side of one of humanity's first 0:12:51.679 --> 0:12:56.480 and worst inventions, financial debt. Now, before the break, will 0:12:56.559 --> 0:12:59.200 you mentioned that James Swan had participated in the Boston 0:12:59.240 --> 0:13:02.160 Tea party raid switch, if you'll recall, didn't result in 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:05.440 any debts or serious injuries, But that doesn't mean there 0:13:05.480 --> 0:13:09.160 weren't victims. So the British tea merchants whose ships were 0:13:09.240 --> 0:13:12.679 raided lost a fortune in merchandise, and amazingly, one of 0:13:12.720 --> 0:13:16.679 those companies, Davison Newman, is still trying to recoup with 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:17.960 losses today. 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:19.760 And like, who are. 0:13:19.600 --> 0:13:21.600 They trying to recoup this from? Like are they shaking 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:23.480 down the partygoer's descendants or what? 0:13:24.040 --> 0:13:28.280 No shakedowns, but they are accepting donations. So back in 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.280 seventeen seventy four, sixteen chests of tea belonging to the 0:13:31.360 --> 0:13:34.280 Davison Newman company were chucked into the water during the 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:38.160 Boston Tea Party and while the company's founders petitioned King 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:41.400 George to reimburse them for its value, which was four 0:13:41.440 --> 0:13:44.760 hundred and eighty British pounds. The Crown actually declined to 0:13:44.840 --> 0:13:47.720 pay that. They ended up losing more tea in other raids, 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:51.080 and appeals for those claims were also rejected. And that's 0:13:51.120 --> 0:13:53.760 how it went on for seven generations of the company 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:59.320 until finally, in nineteen sixty one, the residents of Jackson County, Oregon, 0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:01.040 decided to make amends. 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:01.920 Wait, Oregon. 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:04.640 Last time I checked, it was nowhere near Boston. So 0:14:04.679 --> 0:14:06.280 what did they have to do with the Boston Tea Party? 0:14:06.400 --> 0:14:11.000 Nothing? Apparently it still was weighing on their consciences. This 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:14.480 woman named missus Burt Free. In nineteen sixty one, she 0:14:14.600 --> 0:14:18.320 spearheaded a local campaign to pay back her county's fair 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:22.640 share of the company's losses. After adjusting for inflation, they 0:14:22.680 --> 0:14:25.520 determined that the long lost shipment was worth just under 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:28.880 five thousand dollars, So they divided that number by the 0:14:28.880 --> 0:14:31.880 then current population of the United States and calculated the 0:14:31.960 --> 0:14:36.200 portionate share owed by residents of Jackson County, which was 0:14:36.280 --> 0:14:40.680 like what five dollars or a dollar ninety six? So 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:44.080 the money was contributed by seventeen residents and was delivered 0:14:44.120 --> 0:14:46.440 as a check along with the letter of explanation from 0:14:46.480 --> 0:14:49.440 the mayor of the largest city in Jackson County. 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:51.440 That is such a ridiculous amount. 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:53.800 It actually reminds me of the scene from The Jerk 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:56.120 where Steve Martin's having to sign the checks for the 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.600 class action lawsuit her life four dollars and twelve cents 0:14:59.680 --> 0:15:02.440 or whatever it was. But it is such a ridiculous amount, 0:15:02.440 --> 0:15:04.600 like it almost feels like an insult. But do we 0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:06.440 know what Davison Newman thought of all this? 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:11.280 Well, they apparently appreciated the gesture because a spokesman accepted 0:15:11.320 --> 0:15:14.520 the check in person. His name was Leslie Simons, and 0:15:14.560 --> 0:15:16.680 he said the company hoped this would be the first 0:15:16.680 --> 0:15:22.880 of many SUSH payments. The last yeah quote, the government 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:26.920 never gave us a peep. Bostonians simply smiled. But Jackson County, 0:15:27.120 --> 0:15:30.240 oh they are fine folk. Now we are waiting to 0:15:30.280 --> 0:15:32.880 hear from the rest of Oregon's counties and from the 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:35.080 other forty nine states, right right, right? 0:15:35.120 --> 0:15:37.480 So did actually anything come from all the waiting? 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:40.840 Nope, the company hasn't received another direct payment from the public, 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:43.160 and you know, I don't think they're really expecting to 0:15:43.240 --> 0:15:44.640 write oh. 0:15:44.480 --> 0:15:46.840 Wow, which makes that bug ninety from Oregon just so 0:15:47.040 --> 0:15:47.600 much sweeter. 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:49.160 That's pretty wild, all right. 0:15:49.200 --> 0:15:51.640 Okay, speaking of long standing debts, did you know that 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:55.080 Finland is the only country to fully pay back its debts. 0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:57.560 From World War One? Did you know that? Did you 0:15:57.600 --> 0:15:58.280 have your listen? 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:01.720 Really, most of your borrowed money from the US during 0:16:01.720 --> 0:16:03.680 the war, but by the time the first payments came 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:06.000 due in the nineteen twenties, most of them were actually 0:16:06.040 --> 0:16:09.040 still too cash strapped to afford it. Now, this situation 0:16:09.120 --> 0:16:12.280 only worsened with the onset of the Great Depression. So finally, 0:16:12.280 --> 0:16:15.840 in nineteen thirty one, President Hoover granted a moratorium on 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:19.280 the collection of war debt. This postponement was only meant 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:22.440 to last a year, but European borrowers treated it like 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:25.640 a permanent pardon, so much so that when the repayments 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:28.560 were scheduled to resume in nineteen thirty three, only a 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:30.440 single country cut the US. 0:16:30.240 --> 0:16:32.280 A check, and that was, of course Finland. 0:16:32.440 --> 0:16:35.120 Now, the country continued to make regular payments until nineteen 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:37.800 seventy six, when its loan was paid in full, and 0:16:37.800 --> 0:16:39.240 that was right on schedule. 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:42.240 I mean, I guess it's cool that they paid us back, 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:45.200 But did Finland just not know that everyone else had 0:16:45.240 --> 0:16:46.080 stopped paying or what. 0:16:46.240 --> 0:16:47.560 Yeah, I was wondering the same thing. 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:49.520 But you know, they didn't do it by accident or 0:16:49.560 --> 0:16:51.960 even out of a sense of moral obligation. Instead, it 0:16:52.000 --> 0:16:55.600 was actually part of an effort to improve Finland's reputation. 0:16:55.280 --> 0:16:56.800 As a reliable debtor. 0:16:57.240 --> 0:16:59.240 Now the country had earned a bad reputation in the 0:16:59.320 --> 0:17:02.720 nineteen twenty after borrowing a large sum of gold from France, 0:17:03.240 --> 0:17:06.479 only to pay it back with devalued Finnish currency. Now, 0:17:06.480 --> 0:17:08.480 the French wound up losing money on the deal, and 0:17:08.520 --> 0:17:12.399 the international markets took notice, so Finland's foreign ministry actually 0:17:12.440 --> 0:17:15.040 had to go into damage control here. Now they knew 0:17:15.080 --> 0:17:18.240 that other European countries had no intention of resuming payments, 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:20.679 and since Finland's debt to the US was a fairly 0:17:20.720 --> 0:17:23.960 small percentage of its annual GDP, they decided it was 0:17:23.960 --> 0:17:25.439 a good idea to just go ahead and pay up 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:27.199 in the hopes of scoring some good press. 0:17:27.480 --> 0:17:28.320 And did it work. 0:17:28.600 --> 0:17:31.639 It actually worked really, really well, So between nineteen thirty 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:35.399 three and nineteen thirty six, nearly three thousand stories were 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:39.040 published in American newspapers, all of them praising Finland for 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:41.840 paying its due when no one else would So one 0:17:41.880 --> 0:17:44.320 of my favorites is this nineteen thirty five piece from 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:48.480 the Indianapolis Times, and it says, quote, on December fifteenth, 0:17:48.520 --> 0:17:51.399 Finland will pay her semi annual war debt installment of 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:54.240 about a quarter of a million dollars. It's sure nice 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:56.720 to think one nation will drop a remembrance in the 0:17:56.800 --> 0:17:59.560 lean old sock this year. Now on our best finish, 0:17:59.640 --> 0:18:04.440 we wish for a merry Christmas housekoo yalua. 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:06.760 I said it just right, Ma, didn't I love it? 0:18:06.880 --> 0:18:07.320 Nailed it? 0:18:07.480 --> 0:18:08.720 You didn't know I spoke Finnish. 0:18:08.720 --> 0:18:10.919 I did not know that. But I'm guessing after that 0:18:10.960 --> 0:18:13.320 Finland could borrow money from whoever they wanted, right. 0:18:13.240 --> 0:18:15.760 I mean pretty much. The pr campaign works so well 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:20.160 that a fact about Finland's reliability was written into American textbooks, 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:23.679 and decades later, many people still refer to Finland as 0:18:24.160 --> 0:18:26.080 the country that pays its debts. 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:29.440 So the Finish are basically the Lanisters of the EU, 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:30.080 that's right. 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:32.240 I mean, I don't think they'll get along quite so 0:18:32.359 --> 0:18:34.960 well with their siblings, but otherwise sure. 0:18:35.560 --> 0:18:38.119 Well, here's another story of a debt repayment, or at 0:18:38.160 --> 0:18:40.600 least a partial one. So do you remember the early 0:18:40.720 --> 0:18:43.800 nineties when Willie Nelson owed the IRS like tens of 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:46.000 millions of dollars in unpaid taxes. 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:47.760 And they I think they like raided his house for 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:49.639 something too, right, Yeah, it was worse than that. 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:53.639 So the IRS actually seized Nelson's property in six different 0:18:53.680 --> 0:18:56.840 states on the same day, and the federal agents who 0:18:56.880 --> 0:18:59.679 raided his primary home in Austin, Texas also stock thousands 0:18:59.720 --> 0:19:04.360 of his personal belongings, including instruments, master recordings, studio equipment, 0:19:04.840 --> 0:19:07.160 and the idea was to sell the items at auction 0:19:07.359 --> 0:19:11.240 to help settle the singer's enormous tax bill, but things 0:19:11.240 --> 0:19:14.080 didn't quite go as planned. So Willie had seen the 0:19:14.080 --> 0:19:16.440 writing on the wall ahead of the raid and made 0:19:16.480 --> 0:19:19.760 sure he was away golfing in Hawaii when the IRS 0:19:19.800 --> 0:19:20.560 agents arrived. 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:24.840 Wait, Willie Nelson played golf. I didn't know that. That's 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:28.280 almost episode. This episode needs to go in a different 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:29.040 direction now. 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:29.760 Yeah. 0:19:30.440 --> 0:19:34.280