From: "Vladimir Z. Nuri" <vznuri@netcom.com>
Date: Sun, 14 Apr 1996 01:08:01 +0800
To: perry@piermont.com
Subject: Re: Money supply is fake anyway
In-Reply-To: <199604111444.KAA20811@jekyll.piermont.com>
Message-ID: <199604112040.NAA18876@netcom7.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



PM:
>Thomas Grant Edwards writes:
>> Banks "invent" money on a daily basis.
>
>Really? Since when?

since we left standards that tie money to things physical with
value. i.e.-- the federal reserve was created, supposedly moving
to a gold standard, but which was given up, and then we moved
to silver, which was then thrown away by Nixon or whoever.

TGE was obviously referring to the way that all banks are authorized to
lend money that they don't actually have in assets based on our
banking system. they are all "tentacles" of the federal reserve,
so to speak. <g>

people say, "so what if we don't use gold. money is just an abstraction".
perhaps so, but think of this: if an economy collapsed such that
money no longer had any psychological value, would you like to go to your 
bank and have them say, "sorry, we don't guarantee our money"? or would
you like to go pick up your few pounds of gold or whatever that the
money represented? I can guarantee you this: the latter scenario is
not possible in our current system, and if you think it is, perhaps
you will encounter a reality check (like the crash of '29 was).

a long time ago a "banknote" referred to gold, and that banknote could
be traded for that gold. manipulations in our system caused us to lose
that standard. few people will understand this, and those that control
the money supply and benefit therefrom would prefer it that way.

the power of printing and creating money is far more significant than
most people understand. again, those that do understand it would
prefer that it stays this way.

a somewhat amusing book called "Last Waltz of the Tyrants" might
interest some. there are many more substantial books on the subject
as well. 

these issues are going to come to the forefront if digital money
ever gets off the ground. again, I expect that there are a lot
of people secretly working against digital money because it has
the potential to interfere with monomaniacal power structures already
in place.

sure, I'll be flamed by some for writing this, but what is the
cpunk list without a little delicious conspiracy theory?