He pauses to ask the waiter for more bread, then continues. “My great-great-great-great-great-great grandnephew is a derivatives trader in the City of London. A derivatives trader!” The very idea is preposterous to him. Derivatives, he observes, are a zero-sum game, meaning that for every dollar gained by someone, there is a dollar lost by someone else, leaving the participants “not an hour richer” than they were before.
Mr. Scrooge turns his attention to the traumatic events of 2008, when the global financial system was on the edge of collapse, saved only by a series of government bailouts and emergency measures, at extraordinary cost.
“Now what caused all this?” he asks. “Hubris! The banks had borrowed too much, to give out loans to people at rates that were preposterously low, given the risk involved. This is obvious now.”
I can’t help but interject that he is, to many, the original subprime lender, known for making usurious deals. (I refrain from reminding him that when the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come gave him a glimpse of the future, he saw to his horror that his debtors were actually cheered by his death.) But Mr. Scrooge brushes aside the comparison. Did he and Jacob Marley make loans against flimsy collateral, as U.S. banks and mortgage companies did? No. Did they lend to people they did not even know, or outsource the collection of debts to third parties? Never. “We always knew our customer. And rarely did we lend money to someone who was already in over his head.” When I tell him about the recent comments of Toronto-Dominion Bank chief Ed Clark, who suggested that it was up to the government and not the banks to rein in Canadians’ habit of borrowing too much, Mr. Scrooge is aghast. “The government? They have enough to do. They must run the prisons, the workhouses, and many other things. Why can’t these bankers just take on the responsibility for themselves? Humbug.”
For a moment is sounding exactly like the Ebenezer Scrooge of old, and I have to wonder how much he has really changed. Then something happens that makes it perfectly clear that he has. The bill arrives, and before I can even raise my hand, he snatches it away and pulls out his wallet.
“Merry Christmas,” he bellows. “God bless us, everyone!”
-----
Résumé
EBENEZER SCROOGE
Banker, philanthropist
Apprenticed under Fezziwig
Proprietor of Scrooge and Marley LLC (financial services)
Age: Unknown, though he has lived in the popular imagination for 167 years.
---
BIGGEST WIN
Getting a chance to redeem himself, after wasting years as a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, covetous old sinner.
---
BIGGEST PERSONAL LOSS
There were a few. As a young man, he was dumped by his long-time girlfriend, Belle, who got fed up with his relentless pursuit of money. His attitude toward life was altered by the deaths of his sister, Fran, and his long-time business partner, Jacob Marley, who died on Christmas Eve.
----
GREATEST FEAR
Being forced to roam the Earth for all eternity bound in the chains of greed, like his old friend, Marley.
----
FAMOUS MOMENT
After his epiphany, he went to the office early the day after Christmas to wait for his clerk, Bob Cratchit. Mr. Cratchit showed up for work 18 minutes late, braced for an upbraiding by his boss – and Mr. Scrooge, after first pretending to be angry, proceeded to give his long-time deputy a raise.
