Ranting to /dev/null

You have two cows

No, really, you do. See? The link goes to a list of "two cow jokes", parodies of the "Economics 101" example "You have two cows. Your neighbor has chickens..." etc. used to demonstrate the limits of the barter system. It turns how, however, that just about anything can be explained under this model. Some of my personal favorites:

Pacifism:
You have two cows. They stampede you.

Surrealism:
You have two cows. The government paints one of them green and forces you to take harmonica lessons.

Capitalism - Canadian:
You have two cows. The bank takes both of them, shoots one, and throws away the milk. You shoot yourself.

Capitalism - Hong Kong:
You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax deduction for keeping five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via a Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority shareholder, who sells the rights to all seven cows' milk back to the listed company. The annual report says that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Meanwhile, you kill the two cows because the feng shui is bad.

Simpsonism:
You have two cows. Mmmm.... cows.

New Zealandism:
You have two sheep.

Posted by ryan at August 21, 2004 09:27 AM | TrackBack