An estimated value of about $2.5 billion has been pinned on works that could be sold from the collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts. The city owns the collection and has a debt of around $11 billion. The city manager in charge of balancing the books says creditors will want to know the value of the museum's art, and they may want the city's assets sold.

A fire sale of priceless masterpieces by the likes of Van Gogh, Picasso, Matisse, Rembrandt, and others would not be an easy or quick fix.

Among the snags would be the federal bankruptcy code's Chapter 9, which prohibits a judge or creditors from forcing the city to sell its assets. A 2012 tax millage voted in by Detroit residents to support the museum would need to be rescinded as well.

Other practical details would include the need to very slowly trickle so many masterworks onto the market.

From Reuters: Imagine if Greece, with all its financial difficulties, sold off the Acropolis. Or if the Madrid government auctioned the treasures of the Prado. Or Italy pillaged its classical and Renaissance inheritance to fix a temporary lack of funds...If Detroit gets this wrong it may earn a place in history as the first city to condemn itself to a lingering death because of a failure to understand the value of art to its residents.