Venetian subprime discount

Jeremy Gantz

In what must rank as the most ineffective solution for the subprime meltdown, a Venice restaurant is now offering a discount to all Americans: A notice in English now hangs on the door of [owner Arrigo Cipriani’s] restaurant: “Harry’s Bar of Venice in an effort to make the American victims of subprime loans happier has decided to give them a special 20% discount on all the items of the menu during the short term of their recovery”. A novel idea, but misplaced: In the Italian newspaper story, the owner notes that most of the Americans in the restaurant are “extremely affluent and immune to ‘subprime sickness.’” Meanwhile, the U.S. economy’s “long hangover” continues.

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Jeremy Gantz is an In These Times contributing editor working at Time magazine.

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