Business / Billionaires

Zimbabwe : A nation of billionaires

Thanks to Gideon Gono, the present Governor of the Reserve Bank and President Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe now has the highest percentage of Billionaires per capita than any other country in the world. Once dubbed the “bread basket” of Africa, Zimbabwe has been struggling with the world’s highest rate of inflation – 12,500,000% – and years […]

Sep 03, 2008 | By Luxuo

Thanks to Gideon Gono, the present Governor of the Reserve Bank and President Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe now has the highest percentage of Billionaires per capita than any other country in the world.

Once dubbed the “bread basket” of Africa, Zimbabwe has been struggling with the world’s highest rate of inflation – 12,500,000% – and years of economic mismanagement under President Robert Mugabe.

Try looking at the numbers: 1.00 USD = 54,000,000,000 ZWD. (Live rates at 2008.07.29) But remember that Zimbabwe slashed three zeros off the currency in August 2006, so based on the pre-2006 Zimbabawe dollar, the numbers are even worse: : 1.00 USD = 54,000,000,000,000 ZWD

Notes in the millions of dollars are useful only as toilet paper and it’s cheaper to light a fire with low denomination bills than with newspaper. House prices and lottery prizes are quoted in quadrillions – that’s with 15 zeros.
A cup of coffee at a government-owned five-star hotel was 250 billion Zimbabwe dollars, or $US5.30 this week…

Zimbabweans says it’s only a matter of time before big ticket items will be priced in the quintillions, which have 18 zeros … Though, it doesn’t make sense to go to work any more and it could take now 10 years to rebuild the economy…

Well, I think I’ll just wait to go to Zimbabwe until next week, so I can be a Trillionaire. Or maybe next month, so I can be a Zillionaire and then I may be able to grab a giant sack of Zimbabwe dollars and throw it all over the bed before I make love ^_^


 
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