Hungary's Needy Given Money to Burn

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Hungary's Needy Given Money to Burn

Posted by samzenpus on Monday February 13, 2012 @05:05AM from the idioms-to-the-rescue dept.

Knowing that ideas are a dime a dozen and eager to think outside the box, Hungary's central bank is burning old currency to help the needy. The bank has found that the 40-50 tons of currency that needs to be burned every year is a blessing in disguise for people caught between a rock and a hard place due to the extreme cold sweeping across Europe.

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Up in smoke by powerlord · 2012-02-13 05:11 · Score: 4, Interesting

Watched the video. Not sure how much energy it takes to process the currency into briquets, but it is certainly one of the most innovative "Recycling" programs I've seen, and from the looks of it, one that actually benefits all parties involved (Central Bank gets to destroy old currency, Poor get free fuel).

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1. Re:Up in smoke by powerlord · 2012-02-13 08:35 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  [rhetorical]Is the shredding/compaction process along with the delivery by trucks and collection by individual citizens truly superior to simply sending the unprocessed notes off to be burned in great, big boilers to generate steam-powered electricity for wider, cheaper distribution of power?[/rhetorical]
  
  I know you said rhetorical, so you probably know the answer, but:
  Sure, burning it in one place for power generation would probably be a more efficient use of the "disposable cash", assuming that is the problem they are trying to solve. In this case though the problem is: "We have these poor people who are freezing in the winter." and someone else noticed "Hey, we're going to burn this used money we took out of circulation. If we can process it a little more, maybe we can give it away to the poor and kill two birds with one 1,000 Euro brick."
  Doesn't make it the MOST efficient way of doing things, just a better use of the resources they had available.
  To make everyone happy, those who disapprove of the solution can complain that "They just keep throwing money at the problem and expect it to go away".
  
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Re:Yeah...thanks, I guess by RazzleFrog · 2012-02-13 05:14 · Score: 4, Insightful

Providing wood or coal would be an extra cost to the government. If they already have the paper and are already destroying it why not compress it into a useful brick for burning. I'd imagine it wouldn't burn that fast if compressed enough.
Depressing by CryptDemon · 2012-02-13 05:14 · Score: 5, Funny

I can't help but think of how depressed I would be with the irony if I were in this situation. I'm so poor and don't have money, but the government was kind enough to bring some to me and let me watch it burn.
1. Re:Depressing by d3ac0n · 2012-02-13 05:45 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Not really.
  If you watch the video you will see that they aren't giving out stacks of bills in bank bands, but rather shredded note stock compressed into highly dense bricks and mortared together with a flammable medium.
  According to the video they burn with roughly the same intensity as brown coal (AKA: Lignite). It's not the greatest fuel ever, but in a country where most homes are still heated by either steam boilers or coal/wood burning stoves, it's an acceptable alternative to either re-circulating the notes and causing hyperinflation (thus worsening the poor's problems by many times over) or having the poor denude the countryside looking for wood to burn. Hungary controls it's money supply AND the poor get free fuel to get them through the winter. Sounds like a good deal to me.
  
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Re:Yeah...thanks, I guess by DustPuppySnr · 2012-02-13 05:15 · Score: 5, Informative

"Our examination showed that the heating properties of these shredded currency briquettes are similar to brown coal so they are pretty useful for heating and resolve the problem to find fuel."
Re:Shades of Depression-era Germany by Anonymous Coward · 2012-02-13 05:18 · Score: 5, Interesting

Absolutely. this image immediately came to mind.
Re:Shades of Depression-era Germany by Anonymous Coward · 2012-02-13 05:35 · Score: 5, Informative

Not really a great analogy.
Firstly, any government can build a mandate partially on dubious slogans. There's already plenty of people in the US who want compensation against the ills brought onto them by conspiring bankers, so a party that adopted that mandate would probably be radical, but at least get some votes.
Secondly, just because the fellas are burning money doesn't mean they are burning money like Germany. Any central bank destroys money each year when the money is too old to use. Bills deteriorate, become obsolete due to no security features etc. Hungary's inflation has been around 3-4% for several years so no need to fear hyperinflation just yet.
Re:Shades of Depression-era Germany by nedlohs · 2012-02-13 05:41 · Score: 4, Interesting

Sure if you ignore that they are the exact opposite situations.
One is burning currency because the government is printing so much that it's worthless.
the other is burning currency because the government doesn't want to increase the supply of currency (and hence make it worthless) as it produces new notes.