Superboy Saves The Economy!

Just happened across this story last night and I thought it would make a very topical post. In Superboy #59 (September 1957), the Lad of Steel is asked to help out the government with a new missile, called the Mole. As the name implies, it attacks by burrowing underground and then surfacing in enemy territory. The military wants Superboy to track the missile with his x-ray vision to make sure it does not go off course:



However, when Superboy returns to the military base, he does so by burrowing underground. Did the explosion affect him in some weird way, turning him into a mole?

Then the story turns even stranger. Underground, Superboy starts hoarding gold:



He finds ingenious ways to use the gold to help maintain his position underground:



But it's all for a good reason as we learn here:



Ironically, Superboy himself had caused the problem when he was tracking the Mole Missile:



Yep, that reverse-alchemy vision of Superboy's is surely his most useless ability, which may explain why it's one of the superpowers that time forgot.

Superboy fantasizes about what would have happened had he not rectified his mistake:



Sounds depressingly familiar. Maybe the US economy could use a little Superboy stimulus package!