The more things change, the more they stay the same. When it comes to debt things never change. Since the beginning of time, man has been writing IOU's that often became uncollectible. The very act of farming required credit or the borrowing of other people's surpluses. Credit based on barter became very impractical and thus the need for money evolved. Today, even though we track everything on computers and global networks, the basic economic functions haven't evolved. And there's the rub. We haven't figured out how to make everyone whole and thus the need for frequent jubilees. Lending at interest kind of makes it all an inevitability.