[HPforGrownups] Goblins

[manawydan]

No: HPFGUIDX 60424

Kelly wrote:
>I join the ranks of those who are worried about the goblins having control
>over the WW's money.  If they joined Voldemort, the WW would have some
major
>problems on their hands.  It would also serve as a brilliant distraction
>from the actual war effort as the fighters on the side of light could be
>reduced to figuring out where their next meal was coming from or how to
>retake Gringotts instead of the actual problem, defeating Lord Voldemort.
>The DE's would have unprecedented power simply because they'd be the only
>one with any money. I don't things will get this dire, and I sincerely hope
>they are the equivalent of Switzerland, but this whole setup does greatly
>concern me.

It would depend I think on how monetised the WW economy actually is - for
example, it's conceivable that a lot of transactions take place by barter
rather than in cash. Our view is biased because the only transactions we've
seen are the (slightly unusual) ones in Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade. But out
in the sticks (where it's reasonable to conclude that most wizards are
engaged in some sort of craft production) then there could well be little
need for money anyway - if I grow food and you weave robes, then we have
scope for mutual transactions, just as I have with the local potion maker,
wand repairer, and so on. In that sort of circumstance, a DE takeover of
Gringotts would be bad news for the shopkeepers in Diagon Alley, but not
necessarily fatal.

The Sergeant Majorette said:
>Thanks for these insights. I was having trouble with the concept of
>our crazysexycool Bill Weasley as a grave-robbing imperialist. Also,
>could it be that Gringott's is the Federal Reserve Bank of the WW,
>i.e., the only one that officially interacts with financial entities
>outside the WW, and that there might be local wizarding credit unions
>or mutual aid societies that operate entirely in the community (as
>the do in immigrant communities in NYC where I live)?

If Gringotts are the only wizarding bank, then they'd be the bank for
wizards in Egypt as well as here so there shouldn't be any question of
imperialism. It's in the interest ( no pun intended) of the WW in any case
for Gringotts to have access to a source of gold if, as seems possible, they
pay interest (either by magical means - your money literally grows in the
vault, or by conventional means that compare to ours. All that gold has to
come from _somewhere_).

Why would wizards need credit btw? That would suggest that their economy
runs by the same sort of rules as ours, which certainly isn't proven.

The crossover between the Goblins and the muggles does worry me, though. I
truly can't see the WW allowing muggle bankers to know about the magical
world. But on the other hand there has to be some way of establishing that
exchange rate between muggle and wizard money, and something that the
Goblins can do with the muggle money that they exchange.

JOdel wrote:
>That Binns had his 4th years writing weekly essays on goblin rebellions
>throughout the 18th century is a pretty strong indication that the banking
>franchise in itself was not enough to satisfy them all. I suspect that the
goblin
>"government" disclaimed any responsibility in any of such rebellions with a
lot of
>po-faced denunciations about malcontents while doing nothing to quell them.

There's nothing of course to exclude the Goblins being involved in other
activities than finance. After all, we don't really know anything about how
their society works or what else they do. The description of the vaults
under Gringotts suggests that they have considerable abilities in the mining
and engineering fields so I wonder if they are also the folk you have in to
do building work?

Cheers

Ffred

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