Listening to a report on @NPR @MorningEdition about companies reporting straight-up fictitious earnings on their financial statements.

Preceding the ENRON debacle (remember that one?), the company exploited a loophole ("mark it to market"), that allowed them to report completely fictitious earnings as if they were real, inflating their stock prices.

ENRON's actions led to 38 rolling blackouts in California (disrupting the world's 5th largest economy), as well as $40billion in losses to investors, and the collapse of a major accounting firm (Arthur Anderson)

I mean, economies are fantasies anyway, right? So why should we care?

We should care because once companies are allowed to declare fictitious earnings, they start to believe they deserve those earnings, that they are "owed" those earnings.

In case after case, when the government steps in and "fulfills the fiction," either by making whole the "losses" (on fictional earnings) or by failing to hold accountable those responsible for damages, it is the taxpayers - you and me - who suffer and ultimately pay the costs.