The problem has triggered a multibillion-dollar effort to fix the software problems before the millennium. The federal government says that the public need not panic. But the grass-roots movement isn't buying it. As We Know It. The alarmists believe that the government is playing down the danger in order to stave off public panic or a run on the banks.
Suspicion is a powerful energizer.
The Y2K experts are now saying that this is not merely a technological problem but a social one as well. Some of the fears could become self-fulfilling prophecies. When the Strackbeins talk to their neighbors, they get a lot of funny looks. Washington isn't the West Coast, where Y2K is already a cultural storm. He went to a meeting about Y2K at the Center for Visionary Leadership, a nonprofit organization above a Starbucks coffee shop on Wisconsin Avenue next to his own office.