BYJONATHAN KAY
IMAGINE THAT YOU ARE IN THE LATE STAGES OF A GAME of Monopoly, battling it out against a lone remaining opponent. You each control a bunch of expensive properties, all loaded with hotels. Both of you also are cash-poor, with no spare properties left to mortgage. Every roll of the dice carries high stakes. If your opponent lands on one of your hotels, the only way he can pay the rent will be to sell off his own hotels at a 50- percent discount (because that is how the rules of Monopoly work), and vice versa. This means that the first player who lands on an opponent’s hotel will not just lose a lot of money: He will also lose the assets he needs to earn that money back. In real life, the analogy would be the poor worker in Victorian Britain who, unable to pay a small debt, goes to debtor’s prison, which further compromises his ability to earn a livelihood, and so pushes his family deeper into complete destitution.