Re: Economic meltdowns in SF

On Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:19:22 -0700 (PDT), Mark_Reichert@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:

>I know I should be avoiding reality here, but given the implications
>of Bear Stearns if the other investment banks are just as ridiculously
>leveraged, I was wondering what SF stories have which SF stories have
>had economic bad times as background and which have actually dealt
>with the economics as subject material.

First, a nit: banks are *supposed* to be "ridiculously leveraged".  
Their job isn't to be Custodians of Giant Money Bins, but middlemen
between people who at the moment have more money than they need and
those who right now need more money than they have.  

They are also supposed to be exceedingly conservative in this role,
on account of being responsible for other people's money, and it is 
there rather than the degree of leveraging that B-S went wrong.

For a quasi-SFnal example of banking done *right*, and why it really
is massively superior to the old ways, try Neal Stephenson's "Baroque
Cycle".


But you asked about economic and financial collapse:

There's Alexis Gilliland's "Rosinante" trilogy, which begins right 
after an asteroid-mining boom has gone bust and ends with an incipient
collapse of the world banking system.

J. Neil Schulman's _Alongside Night_ has an economic collapse as a
major plot driver.

The setting and backstory of Peter Hamilton's "Mindstar" trilogy is
an England just recovering from a worldwide financial collapse and
the political fallout thereof.


And there's no shortage of SF where economic or financial catastrophe
is the "obvious" result of either First Contact or Technological
Advance, though that doesn't sound like what you're looking for.


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