What IF You Had Infinite Money? — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00You tap your card. Beep. Approved. It's
2. 0:03always [music] approved. You buy every
3. 0:05pair of sneakers in the store. All 312
4. 0:08pairs. Beep. Approved. You buy a
5. 0:11Lamborghini. You're 15. You can't drive.
6. 0:14So, you hire a driver. Beep. Approved.
7. 0:17The guy at the register stares at the
8. 0:19receipt, then at you. Who are you?
9. 0:22Honestly, I'm still working that out. A
10. 0:25normal 15-year-old has to earn money
11. 0:27slowly. Mowing lawns, babysitting,
12. 0:31bagging groceries. Even when you grow
13. 0:33up, a typical full-time worker in
14. 0:35America earns about $60,000 a year.
15. 0:38Rent, food, bills, car payments, and
16. 0:41whatever's left over, maybe a vacation.
17. 0:44The odds of winning the Powerball
18. 0:45jackpot? About 1 in 292 million. And
19. 0:50even that runs out. Yours doesn't. Ever.
20. 0:53So, what if you had infinite money?
21. 0:56Here's how it works. You've got one
22. 0:58black card. No name, no limit, no bank
23. 1:01can explain it. [music] And there's only
24. 1:03one. Lose it, and it's gone. When you
25. 1:06pay, the money just appears in the
26. 1:07store's account, [music]
27. 1:08brand new. Nobody loses a cent. So, free
28. 1:12money. What's the catch? Well, what
29. 1:15actually is money? In America, there's
30. 1:18about 22 trillion dollars of it. And
31. 1:20almost all of that isn't coins or bills.
32. 1:23It's just [music] numbers on screens.
33. 1:25Money is a promise. A way of saying,
34. 1:27"I'll trade you this for that." But
35. 1:30money isn't stuff. Printing more money
36. 1:32doesn't make more bread. Picture an
37. 1:34island. 100 loaves of bread. 100 dollars
38. 1:38on the whole island. One loaf costs
39. 1:40about a dollar. Now, double the money.
40. 1:42Still 100 loaves. So, now [music] each
41. 1:45loaf costs two dollars. That's
42. 1:47inflation. Too much money chasing the
43. 1:50same stuff. The Federal Reserve tries to
44. 1:53keep prices rising about 2% a year.
45. 1:55Slow, steady,
46. 1:57>> [music]
47. 1:57>> boring. Just how they like it. So,
48. 1:59here's the rule. Your card never runs
49. 2:02out, but every dollar it makes is brand
50. 2:04new. Spend a little and nobody notices.
51. 2:07Spend a lot and every price in the
52. 2:09country goes up for everyone. [music]
53. 2:11Your money is infinite. The world's
54. 2:14stuff isn't. But honestly, the first
55. 2:16month is amazing. You never look at a
56. 2:19price tag again, not once. You pay off
57. 2:22your mom's mortgage. She cries. Then she
58. 2:24checks the bank app. Then she cries
59. 2:26again. You turn your bedroom into a
60. 2:28gaming room. Every console, every game,
61. 2:31six screens, a chair that costs more
62. 2:33than most cars. You buy courtside seats
63. 2:36for the whole season. Then you buy the
64. 2:38seats next to them for your friends. You
65. 2:40buy pizza for your entire school. Every
66. 2:43student, every teacher, even the vice
67. 2:45principal who gave you detention. Your
68. 2:47best friend [music] still buys the pizza
69. 2:49on Fridays, every time. My turn.
70. 2:52>> [music]
71. 2:52>> It's always his turn. He won't let you
72. 2:54pay. Not once. You fly first class. Then
73. 2:58you buy the plane. Your mom's old car
74. 3:00breaks down. You buy her a new one and
75. 3:03one for the neighbor and one for the
76. 3:04neighbor's dog, just in case. And every
77. 3:07bill that comes in the mail, paid before
78. 3:09you even open it. But where it gets
79. 3:11really crazy is when [music] you think
80. 3:13bigger. You want a Ferrari? Easy. You
81. 3:16want every new Ferrari? Not so easy.
82. 3:20They only make about 14,000 a year.
83. 3:22>> [music]
84. 3:22>> Infinite money and you're still on a
85. 3:24waiting list. Money can buy things. It
86. 3:27can't make them faster. And it gets
87. 3:29crazier. Sports. [music] You want your
88. 3:31own football team, a pro one. The most
89. 3:34valuable team in the league is worth
90. 3:36about 13 billion dollars. You could buy
91. 3:39it before breakfast, but you can't just
92. 3:41buy it. The other owners have to vote.
93. 3:43You need 24 of the 32 to say yes. They
94. 3:46take one look at a 15-year-old with a
95. 3:48black card and they [music] say no. And
96. 3:51it gets crazier. Space. A trip to the
97. 3:53space station costs tens of millions of
98. 3:56dollars per seat. You buy every seat on
99. 3:59the rocket. You take your mom and your
100. 4:01best [music] friend. Your mom floats
101. 4:03past the window eating a cookie. Don't
102. 4:05you dare get crumbs in the air vents.
103. 4:07And it gets crazier. Gold. All the gold
104. 4:10ever mined would fit in a cube about 72
105. 4:13feet wide, about as tall as a
106. 4:14seven-story building. At today's prices,
107. 4:17it's worth [music] tens of trillions of
108. 4:19dollars. So, you start buying. And every
109. 4:22time you buy, the price goes up. The
110. 4:24more you want something, the more it
111. 4:26costs, even for you. And it gets
112. 4:28crazier. Counting. Your balance doesn't
113. 4:31have a number, [music]
114. 4:32just a little sideways eight. If you
115. 4:34counted $1 every second, a million would
116. 4:37take you 11 days. A billion? 32 years. A
117. 4:41trillion? 32,000 years. You'd have had
118. 4:45to start long before anyone had built a
119. 4:47city. And it gets crazier. Houses. You
120. 4:50buy every house on your street. You give
121. 4:52them to the people living in them. Keys
122. 4:54for everyone. A block party. Balloons,
123. 4:56cake. And then, something strange. The
124. 4:59houses on the next street go up in
125. 5:01price. 20% in a month. Huh. Then the
126. 5:05world notices. The bank tests the card.
127. 5:08Every [music] chip, every layer. It's
128. 5:10just plastic. A normal card. Except, it
129. 5:13isn't. The government loves you. At
130. 5:16first, most things you buy come with
131. 5:18sales tax, around 7%. [music] So, every
132. 5:21time you spend a billion dollars, about
133. 5:2370 million of it goes to the government.
134. 5:26You're the biggest taxpayer in history.
135. 5:28And you've never had a job. Charities
136. 5:31line up around the block. One study says
137. 5:33it would cost about $33 billion a year
138. 5:37extra [music] to end most of the world's
139. 5:38hunger by 2030. You pay it. Day one.
140. 5:41[snorts]
141. 5:42But money can't build a road through a
142. 5:44war.
143. 5:45>> [music]
144. 5:45>> It can't make a harvest grow faster.
145. 5:47Some of it helps. A lot of it gets
146. 5:49stuck.
147. 5:50>> [music]
148. 5:50>> Then, the fame. 100 million followers.
149. 5:54Your face on a mural. People call you
150. 5:56the bottomless. You get 4,000 texts
151. 5:59[music] a day. Two of them are from
152. 6:01people you actually know. Then, the
153. 6:03rules. The Federal Reserve invites you
154. 6:05in. Cookies. Very small cups of coffee.
155. 6:09Your spending is now bigger than some
156. 6:11countries. Please, [music] slow down.
157. 6:14Congress argues for 11 hours about a law
158. 6:16to stop you. Some senators want a limit.
159. 6:19Others want you to pay for a new
160. 6:20hospital first. They're still arguing.
161. 6:23Some countries stopped taking your
162. 6:24dollars altogether. Thank you. We're
163. 6:27fine. And there's a cost. At first, it's
164. 6:30small. You buy your mom a birthday
165. 6:32present. Then you realize you can buy
166. 6:34anything. So, nothing means anything.
167. 6:38She smiles at the diamond necklace. She
168. 6:40cried at the macaroni card you made her
169. 6:42when you were six. Your phone never
170. 6:44stops. Everyone wants something. Old
171. 6:47friends, new friends, kids at school who
172. 6:49never talked to you before. Your best
173. 6:51friend gets quiet. Still buys the pizza.
174. 6:54But, the pizza goes cold. It's not that
175. 6:56I'm jealous. It's just I don't know what
176. 6:58I can give you anymore. And then, the
177. 7:01quietest one. You're at the corner
178. 7:03store. Your mom's counting coins for
179. 7:05bread. A loaf used to cost about $2. Now
180. 7:08it's three. She doesn't say anything.
181. 7:10She doesn't have to. You did that. One
182. 7:13year later. Prices are rising faster
183. 7:15than they have since 1980, when US
184. 7:17inflation hit almost 15%. Savings are
185. 7:21melting. Retirement money is shrinking.
186. 7:23Every news channel has your face on it.
187. 7:26So, you decide to fix everything. All at
188. 7:28once. The country owes almost 40
189. 7:30trillion dollars. The national [music]
190. 7:32debt. You pay it off. Every cent. One
191. 7:35afternoon. For a moment, the whole
192. 7:38country cheers. Then, the money [snorts]
193. 7:40lands.
194. 7:41>> [music]
195. 7:41>> Almost 40 trillion brand new dollars.
196. 7:44That's almost twice all the money in
197. 7:46America
198. 7:47>> [music]
199. 7:47>> in one afternoon. And people panic. Not
200. 7:50about now, about next. [music]
201. 7:52If you can do that once, you can do it
202. 7:54again and again. Around the world,
203. 7:56everyone starts selling dollars. The
204. 7:58dollar falls. 5%, 10, 15. On the corner
205. 8:03store window, the price of bread gets
206. 8:05crossed out, then crossed out again. In
207. 8:082008, Zimbabwe printed so much money,
208. 8:11prices were doubling about every 25
209. 8:13hours. [music]
210. 8:14The next year, it printed a 100 trillion
211. 8:17dollar bill. Within weeks, it was almost
212. 8:20worthless. Your phone rings. The chair
213. 8:22of the Federal Reserve. [music]
214. 8:24The markets open in 60 seconds. If they
215. 8:26think there's more coming, the dollar is
216. 8:28finished. [music] Every retirement fund,
217. 8:31every savings account, your mom's too.
218. 8:33Unless they see that there's never going
219. 8:35to be more. [music] You look at the
220. 8:36card. Black, shiny, the only one. On the
221. 8:41TV, a camera is pointed at your front
222. 8:43door. Live. [music]
223. 8:44The whole world is watching. Keep it and
224. 8:47you'll never want for anything, ever.
225. 8:50You can leave. Buy an island. Buy a
226. 8:52country that'll still take your money.
227. 8:54Cut it and you're just you again. 50
228. 8:56seconds. Your mom is standing in the
229. 8:58kitchen holding a loaf of bread. $3.80.
230. 9:0240 seconds. Scissors. [music] Kitchen
231. 9:05drawer. Second from the top. 30. Front
232. 9:08door. Cameras. Flashes. You hold the
233. 9:10card up. Your hand is shaking. 10. Snip.
234. 9:14Silence. Two halves of a black card
235. 9:16[music] on the front porch. Then the
236. 9:18markets open. The dollar wobbles, dips,
237. 9:22then it holds. By lunchtime, it's
238. 9:25climbing. By the end of the week, it's
239. 9:27back where it was a month ago. Prices
240. 9:29stay high for a while, but they stop
241. 9:31climbing. Slowly, the panic stops.
242. 9:33[music]
243. 9:34And the reveal? The national debt is
244. 9:36still gone. Every cent. You paid it, and
245. 9:40nobody can ever unpay it. That night,
246. 9:42the Fed chair calls again. Every king,
247. 9:45every emperor, every billionaire in
248. 9:47history wanted more. You had all of it,
249. 9:50and you gave it up in 10 seconds. On
250. 9:53Friday, your best friend shows up with
251. 9:55two boxes of pizza. My turn, he laughed.
252. 9:58It's always your turn. Not anymore. Next
253. 10:00week's on you. Better get a job. A week
254. 10:02later, a knock at the door. Stranger,
255. 10:05gray hoodie, dark glasses, a small white
256. 10:08envelope. You gave up infinite money in
257. 10:1110 seconds. That makes you the only
258. 10:13person on Earth we can trust. Inside the
259. 10:16envelope, a card. White this time. No
260. 10:19name, no limit. And instead of a dollar
261. 10:21sign, a tiny clock. Money was the test.
262. 10:24This one doesn't print money. Then what
263. 10:27does it print? Time. So, would you cut
264. 10:30up the card? Tell us in the comments.
265. 10:32And if you'd have cut it up, too, hit
266. 10:34like and subscribe for more what-ifs.