Tired of carrying around stacks of $50-million-dollar bills to pay for their groceries, Zimbabweans are turning to gasoline vouchers as substitutes for their hyperinflating currency.
Because the government of Zimbabwe will not allow transactions to take place in US dollars, people and businesses are finding other things of value to trade for goods and services. Gasoline vouchers, scarce food, and old coins, which have recently been revalued, are all being traded instead of the Zimbabwean dollar, which now has an inflation rate of about 50 million percent.
To illustrate how bad the inflation is, restaurant owners have been tacking on an extra 80% to the bill of customers who pay by check. That’s the amount needed to compensate for the inflation that will take before the check clears– about five days.
More here.
[HT: Chris Blattman’s Blog]