That is another central point.  The Government literally said the ARMs would stop working if they didn't guarantee and then bail-out the banks.  The whole scam was based on the notion that the banks were indivisible and absolutely essential to the continence of ordinary day to day and business life.

The metaphor of the ATMs not working was actually used to bring home to people the seriousness of the situation - unfortunately in an entirely misleading way.

So the key points are - debt restructuring is an entirely routine way of resolving structural imbalanced which have been allowed to build up between debtors and creditors - for which both are responsible, and yes, the ATMS (which is the sum total of many people's experience of banking - will continue to work before, during and after the process.

Index of Frank's Diaries