As a young airman in Martial Law era Turkey in the late '70s I got an interesting education in economics. The Turks with the most wealth were the Turks who worked at the airbase, drove Taxi's, owned little stores or restaurants right outside the base in a little street we called "rip off alley" for obvious reasons. You see this small % of Turks had access not only to $USD's, like our house boy who shined our shoes and pressed our uniforms, but also those who had access to the thriving black market in American cigarettes, booze, underwear, candy, blue jeans "they loved American blue jeans". And most, like our 50yo house boy, not only made cash around the barracks but was a big player in the blk market, called "bush-bush" at the time.
Its all closed down now. The alley is gone, the house boys are gone, the black market is gone. I know this because my son was sent to Incirlick 30 years after I was there. They took a beautiful, thriving shit hole of quonset huts, dingy show hall, drunken belly dancer shows, where everyone made a profit, and turned it into a Legit airbase. The Hell is wrong with them ? They even put in a 9 hole golf course.
They wouldn't even let these kids off base because of terrorism but we had even more terrorism in the late '70s, hell the province the airbase was in was under Martial Law, but nobody much cared when we got whacked.
Anyway back to economics. The Turk economy back then was really simple. They made nothing anybody wanted "in fact they made nothing nobody wanted" and they could afford little since the Lira was not even ass wipe. Imagine a fiat currency that was 500 to 1 $USD ? But these people loved $USD's so much it was probably the last place in the world that was like post WW2 Berlin with the almighty greenback. I dont remember ever spending anything but $USD's. $1 would get your jump boots shined and your uniform pressed. $20 split between 4 guys would get you a taxi down to the Med sea, keep him with you all day, and then drive you back to base. $2 would get you a sea food lunch with beer that would knock your socks off. $5 would get you laid and then some in the only Muslim country where prostitution was legal.
But the Turks loved the Black Market and loved making $USD and to get such a job they had to send money "up" the ladder and/or have awfully good connections. The one and only thing I remember them making that was worth a damn were pipes made out of some kind of porous rock found only in Turkey named Meerschaum or something like it. That and they were pretty good at rug making and copper metal work. Most Yanks thought it was our #USD's they really loved but I knew better.
You see these societys worship the one thing we are just beginning to understand. That "thing" being Gold. Those $USD's they made were banked until they could use them to buy the real and only bank located in Turkey and all these other 3'rd world shitholes ; That bank being gold. Generational, family gold is all that matters in these places, in middle east societys most of all but in all places where the fiat system failed or more likely never even started in the first place. Its the reason there is so much cousin marriage, 1st cousins most of all, and the reason they all look alike, more or less, due to inbreeding. Thru such familys ties, generation after generation, they keep the only wealth that matters away from corrupt, incompetent Governments and banks. Corrupt cops, Govt. officials, thieves, tax collectors. Were talking about customs that go back thousands of years. Almost to the beginning of civilization.
And one saw the History everywhere. The Roman roads, the castles, the Ottomans, and thru the centuries there was one thing that always held them together no matter the threat or change of occupier. Gold ,and to a bit lesser extent, silver. These privately owned metals tied the people, the towns and villages, the familys, together.
