Musings of a Martian

Happened to pick up a signal the other day from Planet Earth. Seems like there is a lot of chatter these days among the Earthlings. Don't really understand much of what they say (let's put it down to an interplanetary language gap now, shall we?) but the tone would have suggested that something has gone awry. I mean why else would the inhabitants of such a beautiful looking planet look so glum on the telly? A beautiful blue, green and brown thing that planet is, interspersed with little wisps of white that are in a constant state of flux; sigh, sometimes I wish Mars would look like that. And still the Earthlings complain.

Speaking of that distinctive blue-green patchwork of colors that is Planet Earth -- it seems to have gotten that much more beautiful of late. The colors look more distinct and crisp. Not entirely sure why but maybe it has something to do with why the Earthlings have become so despondent of late.

Amidst all the chatter on the telly, I picked up a word that was bandied about a lot: "virus". Sometimes it featured as part of a bigger word, "coronavirus". Now I'll be damned if I know what exactly the fuss is all about but it appears that a certain life-form has emerged on Planet Earth of late and is wreaking havoc in the lives of Earthlings. Maybe this "virus" thing always existed but has somehow crossed paths with Earthlings, of late. And the encounter appears to not be pleasant. Now this will be tough for us Martians to really appreciate or understand because, up here, we tend to know all of what lives around us. No nasty surprises, no sudden discoveries. Maybe this is because it is colder here than down there on Planet Earth. They say that warmer places tend to bustle with life. Not cold, red and boring like up here. God, I would really like to visit Planet Earth one day and see all those exotic creatures and lifeforms that live there. I sometimes see them pop up on my screen when I pick up a signal from a channel called "National Geographic" but, you know, seeing something on the telly and seeing something in real flesh and blood are two different things altogether.

Anyways, now back to what I picked up on the telly the other day from Planet Earth. So there were lots of pictures of these wooden boxes everywhere. "Coffins" they call them. Not sure what these are all about but they appear to be packing lots of Earthlings into these boxes of late. And when this all unfolds, Earthlings look glummer than ever. I guess this marks a permanent departure of sorts, wherein certain Earthlings are put into these boxes and banished for ever to the netherworld. But I find this puzzling: surely, if you dislike someone enough to do this to them, you should not mourn their departure right? Earthlings are a complex bunch. Not sure I will ever understand them.

Oh, and the other day, there was this important-looking Earthling who popped up on the telly and addressed all the Earthlings. His name was "Jerome Powell" and he seemed to be the top boss of something called the "Federal Reserve". He was brimming with a sense of importance as he blabbered on and on about how he was saving the day for the Earthlings. What I was able to takeaway from all this -- and from the questions that all the other Earthlings peppered him with after he was done talking -- was that the Earthlings are worried about a sudden dearth of resources. Now that, fellow Martians, you will appreciate is a very strange thing to get our green heads around: why would you suddenly face a shortage of resources? Here on Mars, we have all we need to go about our lives and it is plentiful: the ice that keeps us hydrated when we are thirsty, the iron oxide-rich red soil that nourishes us and the crisp air that we breathe (albeit not as "thick" as the air they have down there on Planet Earth, grandma once told me). Now Planet Earth looks so much more vibrant so how could they be suddenly short of resources? Well I did some research and it appears that they have this strange concept on Planet Earth called "money". This is like this artificial or notional store of value, sort of like a certificate that gives each Earthling a claim on a resource. Ok, innovative. But, rather bizarrely, if you don't have this "certificate", you cannot claim any resource or use it. No "certificates", no food and, in some places on Planet Earth, no ice or water. The only resource that it appears you can still use freely, without any "certificate" is air. But, maybe that too will be "claimable" only through a certificate some day. I bet you, the day that happens, the Earthlings will pop up on the telly looking even more glum.

So anyways, this "Jerome" guy was a god-like character for the Earthlings, it appears, because he is the only Earthling that has the magical powers to make these new certificates called "money". No one else can do this and so they all worship him. Also, he appears to be getting all this attention of late (and gladly bathing in the limelight with a serious-looking expression on his face), because he is solving this "resource crunch" I adhered to earlier by making and issuing more of these "money certificates". Now this one got me really confused: if you have a shortage of resources, how can issuing more certificates of claim on the same pool of resources solve the problem? That's like saying that if suddenly all our beloved iron-rich red soil here on Mars disappeared in a dust storm of epic proportions, we could solve the problem by dividing up what was left into ever smaller bits for all the Martians. I guess that makes sense to ensure that whatever is left is distributed equitably but it is not as if making these silly certificates would help manufacture more red soil, now would it? Well, I guess the Earthlings know better.

Oh and, finally, there was this strange looking fellow that appeared right at the end of this Earthling ceremony I picked up on the telly: he looked a bit over-sized and almost un-Earthling like in some respects: his hair and skin had this strange reddish-orange tint, almost like the Martian daytime sky when there is a dust storm raging (as there often is). He also had this serious expression on his face which smacked of a sort of feigned self-importance. I got the sense that he wanted to be seen as the top boss and command the ultimate respect of all the Earthlings but, somehow, he knew he was just playing second-fiddle to that god-like creature Jerome Powell. And he didn't like it. My key takeaway from this was that, down there on Earth, he who controls the "money certificate" printing press, also holds the reigns of society. Here on Mars, we worship those that can help us weather the fiercest of dust storms. Down there, they worship those that can whip up a storm of money.

Someday, I will have to make a trip to Planet Earth to figure it all out.

#coronavirus #pandemic #modernmonetarytheory #monetarypolicy #Fed