The latest edition of the classic board game, Monopoly, finally quits kidding itself that capitalism is a jovial game of buying land, building houses, and swapping play money. The 2011 Monopoly is introducing the bailout option, random million dollar bonuses, and enough coke for at least three four-player games of Wall Street-esque transactions.
Daniel Glass, from the 2011 Monopoly team, said, "We found that it's healthy for kids to be exposed to these things at a very early age. Disillusionment is good. It's going to happen to them at some point in their lives. Why wait? That's like putting off circumcision. You don't want to wait till later on that, do you?
"By age ten, they'll understand that they should hide their money and properties from the other players for as long as possible. If the other players perceive weakness, they won't give the weak player loans and will charge them exorbitant rents until they are bankrupt. But of course there is always the bailout option, so you never REALLY lose."
"You don't know what the future cash flows will be on a property," one ten year old said "You gotta get the real estate fast and early in this game!"
There is ten times the amount of money in reserves in the 2011 version. This was in anticipation of inflation and/or bubbles."
Monopoly is considering putting out a game called "Monopoly Zimbabwe." There is no board, no properties. Just a box full of paper that is distributed to every player. And that's it."
