Like melting Antarctica to water your lawn: Why LIBOR matters

Funny thing about NPR’s Weekend All Things Considered—nobody’s listening, so they spend a LONG time on stories. This weekend, it was a gripping 11.5 minute story of the growing LIBOR scandal.

It’s important because there is a very good chance your adjustable rate mortgage is tied to LIBOR is someway. It’s fascinating because of the audacity and idiocy of the manipulators, as described in the NPR story:

NPR Host Guy Raz: One trader in his daily calendar, his diary, wrote, “ask for a high six-month fix,” as if to remind himself that he’s got to ask his colleagues to cheat for him.

Brown University Mark Blyth: He needs a Post-it note to remind himself to rig world interest rates. That’s like melting Antarctica to water your lawn, which is another reason, I think, that this scandal hasn’t quite gotten the press it deserves yet because it’s so hard to contemplate.

Hear the audio, check out the summary, or read the transcript at NPR.