To stimulate the economy, create new jobs and generate new GDP requires an injection of new money. Borrowing from the bond markets or off-balance-sheet in public/private partnerships won’t do it. If Congress won’t issue money directly, it should borrow from banks, which create money on their books when they make loans.
The Trump agenda, it seems, is not set in stone. The president-elect has a range of advisors with as many ideas. Steven Mnuchin, his nominee for Treasury Secretary, said in November that “we’ll take a look at everything,”even the possibility of extending the maturity of the federal debt with 50-year or 100-year bonds to take advantage of unusually low interest rates.
Steve Bannon, appointed chief White House strategist, seems to be envisioning Roosevelt-style experimentation with whatever works. “We’re just going to throw it up against the wall and see if it sticks,” he said in an interview posted by Michael Wolff on November 18th:
Like [Andrew] Jackson’s populism, we’re going to build an entirely new political movement. It’s everything related to jobs. The conservatives are going to go crazy. I’m the guy pushing a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan. With negative interest rates throughout the world, it’s the greatest opportunity to rebuild everything. Shipyards, ironworks, get them all jacked up. . . . It will be as exciting as the 1930s, greater than the Reagan revolution — conservatives, plus populists, in an economic nationalist movement.
That sounds promising. Obsolete systems will go and will be replaced. But how to ensure that the replacements are an improvement?
Another Look at the Trillion Dollar Infrastructure Plan
Current proposals for funding Trump’s $1 trillion infrastructure project have been heavily criticized. In October, his economic advisors Wilbur Ross and Peter Navarro proposed funding the plan with tax credits to private investors, who would then borrow from the bond markets. An infrastructure bank tapping into private investment has also been suggested. Both rely on public/private partnerships. Michelle Chen, writing in The Nation on December 2, calls the plan “a full on privatization assault.”
A February 2015 report by Public Services International titled “Why Public-Private Partnerships Don’t Work” maintains that public/private partnerships are just another form of government borrowing, moved off-balance-sheet to evade debt ceilings and deficit fears. The report concludes:
[E]xperience over the last 15 years shows that PPPs are an expensive and inefficient way of financing infrastructure and diverting government spending away from other public services. They conceal public borrowing, while providing long-term state guarantees for profits to private companies.
PPPs also won’t work to fund the sorts of unprofitable but necessary infrastructure projects that Trump’s plan is supposed to include. As observed on Bloomberg View on November 18th:
The problem is that pension funds, hedge funds and other private parties will only back projects that produce a lucrative and steady stream of revenue to cover operating costs, interest and principal on the debt, and dividends to repay their investment. . . .
Most of the physical structures that undergird the economy — for example, non-tolled roads, sewage-treatment plants, train stations and schools — produce little or no revenue. The same is true for spending on routine maintenance. . . .
Unglamorous projects, like mass transit and removing lead contamination from drinking water, would fail to attract investor interest and therefore wouldn’t get funding. . . .
There’s also the matter of capital shift, in which companies behind already-planned construction seek infrastructure-bank financing, resulting in no net new spending or hiring.
Net New Spending Requires Net New Money
There would be no net new spending or new hiring for another reason. Funding through the bond markets merely recirculates existing money, transferring it from one pocket to another, without creating the new money needed to fund new GDP. Government investment “crowds out” private investment. So argues investment advisor Paul Krasiel in a November 21st article titled “Do Larger Budget Deficits Stimulate Spending? Depends on Where the Funding Comes From.” He writes:
President-elect Trump’s economic advisers have suggested that an increase in infrastructure spending could be funded largely by private entities through some kind of public-private plan. This . . . would not result in net increase in U.S. spending on domestically-produced goods and services and net increase in employment unless there were a net increase in thin-air credit. The private entities providing the bulk of financing of the increased infrastructure spending would have to get the funds either from some entities increasing their saving, that is, by cutting back on their current spending, or by selling other existing assets from their portfolios. . . . [U]nder these circumstances, there would be no net increase in spending on domestically-produced goods and services.
Krasiel concludes that “tax-rate cuts and increased government spending do not have a significant positive cyclical effect on economic growth and employment unless the government receives the funding for such out of ‘thin air’.” So who creates money out of thin air? One obvious possibility is the government itself, following the revolutionary lead of the American colonists and Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. (See my earlier article here.)
But the current conservative Congress is likely to balk at that solution. A more acceptable alternative in that case could be to borrow from banks. Ideally, this would be the central bank, since the loan would be interest-free and could be rolled over indefinitely. But borrowing from private banks would also work, since they too simply create the money they lend on their books. (See the Bank of England’s 2014 quarterly report.) Krasiel writes:
[L]et’s assume that the new government bonds issued to fund new government infrastructure spending are purchased by the depository institution system (commercial banks, S&Ls and credit unions) and the Federal Reserve. In this case, the funds to purchase the new government bonds are created, figuratively, out of “thin air”. This implies that no other entity need cut back on its current spending on goods and services while the government increases its spending in the infrastructure sector.
Most New Money Is Created by Banks
Richard Werner, Professor of Economics at the University of Southampton in the UK, agrees. Werner invented the term “quantitative easing,” but the central banks that adopted the term did not follow his policy advice. They tried to expand credit creation by padding the reserve accounts of banks; but the banks did not follow through with new lending into the market. Werner’s suggestion was for the banks to lend directly to governments.
In a July 2012 research paper titled “How to End the European Crisis – At No Further Cost and Without the Need for Political Changes,” he noted that a full 97% of the UK money supply is created by ordinary commercial banks. That makes banks far superior to the bond market in their ability to create the credit necessary to stimulate the economy. To the objection that banks don’t have sufficient money to fund governments, he wrote:
That may be true in one sense. But this is true for any loan granted by a bank. Which is why banks do not lend money, they create it: banks are allowed to invent a deposit in the borrower’s account (although no new deposit was made by anyone from outside the bank) and since they function as the settlement system of the economy, nobody can tell the difference between these invented deposits and “real” ones.
Werner lists other advantages of governments funding themselves by tapping bank credit lines rather than issuing bonds. One is that the borrowing rate is substantially lower. Basel banking regulations give governments the lowest risk-weighting (zero), so they can borrow from banks at the favored-client rate; and the banks will be happy to lend, because with zero risk-weighting they will need no new capital to back the loans.
Another advantage: “Instead of primary market bond underwriters, such as Goldman Sachs, earning large fees in cosy relationships with semi-privatised public debt management agencies, banks will be the beneficiaries of this business.”
Most important, however, is that with the government as borrower, banks can create the new credit necessary to underwrite new productivity.
For historical precedent, Werner cites the system of short-term bills of trade known as “Mefo Wechsel” issued by semi-public entities in Germany from 1933 onwards. These bills were bought by German banks, increasing bank credit creation:
[T]he sharp German economic recovery from over 20% unemployment in early 1933 to virtually full employment by the end of 1936 was the result of the ensuing expansion in bank credit creation – in other words, it was the funding of fiscal policy through credit creation that caused the recovery, not fiscal stimulus per se. Japan’s experience of the 1990s has proven how even far larger fiscal expansions will not boost the economy at all if they are not funded by credit creation. [Citing sources.]
Unlike borrowing money created by the Federal Reserve, borrowing money created by banks would involve an interest cost. But as Steve Bannon observes, interest rates today are at record lows; and borrowing from banks would have the consummate advantage over borrowing from the bond market that it would expand the pool of bank deposits that are now officially counted as “money” in M2. This is what the Fed tried but failed to do with its quantitative easing policies: stimulate the economy by expanding the bank lending that expands the money supply.
For a compelling video presentation of these ideas, see Prof. Werner’s Power Point given in Dublin in April 2016, linked here.
A revolutionary movement needs a revolutionary financial system. If everything is on the table, as Steven Mnuchin says, the Trump team could consider funding its trillion dollar infrastructure plan with newly-issued credit, whether created by the Treasury or the central bank or through government credit lines with commercial banks. An Andrew Jackson-style president could avoid adding to the national debt altogether, by simply issuing an executive order to the Treasury to mint a trillion dollar coin. As shown in earlier articles here and here, this could be done without the need for congressional approval and without trrggering hyperinflation.
________________
Ellen Brown is an attorney and author of twelve books, including the best-selling Web of Debt. Her latest book, The Public Bank Solution, explores successful public banking models historically and globally. Her 300+ blog articles are at EllenBrown.com. She can be heard biweekly on “It’s Our Money with Ellen Brown” on PRN.FM.
Filed under: Ellen Brown Articles/Commentary | Tagged: banks create money, infrastructure financing, public banking, Trump infrastructure plan |
WEB OF DEBT BLOG 
i hope no one believes that trump and his so called appointees or advisers will ever do anything to their wall street backers who along with a foreign entity{{not russia}} put him in office.trump will do more of the same.can you imagine a goldman sachs partner doing anything but continue goldmans and all the other criminals on wall street enterprise.he said he was a deal maker ,just not the deals for the people.
Werner’s idea of banks lending to governments can only apply to non sovereign governments. Sovereign governments can choose. They can also “borrow” from banks but it is a silly option when they can fund expenditure directly without any borrowing. Funny how few understand what Monetary Sovereignty means.
Is the US a sovereign government?
Does the US have to borrow to fund government spending?
Is there any other ‘legal’ purpose to borrowing?
How else can the government ‘fund expenditures directly’, besides taxation and borrowing?
Please provide a legal reference for that authority.
Thanks.
a] The USA is sovereign. [Greece is not, nor Kansas nor Queensland]
b]the government does NOT need to borrow
but it’s not stopped from doing so if it chooses
c]Legal? means what? If the government passes a law it’s legal.
d]Taxation does not fund spending. It is a COST.
Why borrow your own currency? how stupid is that??
e] the Constitution. It says the government is in charge of its currency.
Hope this helps?
Hitler and Trump are flawed creatures. There is no need to explain that. However, ironically, Hitler showed the world in 1933 how it could save itself from the Great Depression and from all crushing debt . He did it, not by turning Germany into a country that wanted to conquer the world, as so many fools have claimed , but by his taking control of Germany’s own money supply from the private banks. Was Hitler a genius? No, Hitler did the same thing that Lincoln, Andrew Jackson, Thomas Jefferson, and so many others had wanted to. Do you remember the Green Back dollar or JFK’s Executive Order 1110 ? Like so many others, Hitler paid the price for doing his bold move. Germany was soon destroyed by those same people who have plunged the USA into a 20 trillion dollar debt that is sure to ruin the USA and the world within five years. Trump claims that he will go after the Private Banks, The Federal Reserve and Wall Street to save America. Will he? Who knows? But you can count on one thing. The banks will do everything they can to stop Trump from succeeding.
The $20 Trillion “Debt” is not a debt in the way we usually think. It’s what your savings deposit in a commercial bank is considered to be by the bank, a liability. It owes it back to you. The fed is similar in that the debt is a] owed to itself – $5 trillion in intragovernmental funds and b] owed to depositors who have put in $14 Trillion in bonds with the Fed. The Fed doesn’t spend the bond money. It has no use for it. It stores these investor deposits offering interest and reduces the money supply. To refund the sums a simple book keeping operation credits the money back to the depositors own accounts. The whole $19Trillion could be ‘paid back’ in a single day.
It is the debt that the American people must pay back to the Fed….
Government debt is owned not owed by the private sector. The debt need not be paid back to the Fed. To pay the debt would require the private sector to reduce savings. We have not paid back the WWII debt; we have outgrown it. Private debt is the problem. It is over $27 trillion and has to be paid back.
Paying back government debt is very simple and could be done in 1 day. All the Gov’t has to do is reverse the entries that created the loans and the investors get ther deposits back.
The exact opposite!
The America people pay the interest on the National debt. It is not free money. This year that interest will be about $250 billion dollars. Almost half of this interest is paid to China, Russia and Japan…Need I say more?
Right. Most of the interest is income to the private sector. The rest increases foreign debt holdings by a bit. Foreign holdings are the result of trade deficits rather than deficit spending.
your sarcastic comment is uneducated.do you really believe they are holding that piece of crap because they think its a good investment????? they are coerced tobuy tresuries.and for that matter my uneducated friend the fed res gets the bulk of th interes tvia your income tax.wake up !!
Nonsense! Where did you see that? No one is coerced to buy Treasuries. In today’s climate treasuries are treasured. The government guarantees them – so they are safe. The government pays interest [taxpayers not involved].The banks are not lending willingly so spare funds are on ice in the Fed. They are highly liquid, easy to trade etc.
Your call to wake up should be directed at your mirror.
It’s just plain wrong, in reference to National government debt that is.
Of the $20 Trillion US government debt 3/4 of that is investor deposits. The Fed does NOT spend it so paying it back is simply a reversal of the bookkeeping entry. No spending. Interest is paid on these deposits by the Fed and it is, as is ALL Federal spending new money from thin air
Non federal debts are treated as are private debts. The Fed is a wholly different case.
The Fed keeps a lot of the interest for posh operations and paying of dividends.
No. The Fed keeps none of the money it earns, such as from note printing etc. It’s all remitted to Treasury. Then when Treasury instructs the Fed to spend. the spend is with new money, every time.
The Fed cannot keep ‘profit’ from note-printing, because the printing is a function of the TSY Bureau of Engraving and Printing, who provides the Notes to the Reserve Banks for the cost of the printing.
The FR banks issue those Notes to their Member banks for circulation, after they are collateralized into a debt.
The TSY Never spends new money into circulation, Always borrowing from bankers and taxpayers their needed revenues.
Pity, eh?
When is MMT gonna get real, get its head out of its rear, and join the ‘public money’ movement ?
Joe B under another sign? Just as misinformed unfortunately. Actually the Central bank buys debts on instructions from Treasury. All profits are remitted to Treasury [it’s what the name says!] The CB has no money of its own, but it stores lots of others in accounts there. Treasury does spend new money into circulation via the CB, its agent. Keep learning. You’ll get there, we hope. Treasury only spends new money. It never recycles old money.
Actually, you’re wrong on all points.
But there’s no room here.
I sign in as joe bongiovanni, but sometimes my comments get ‘directed’ by the site’s programs (WordPress, or Disqus or ??), to where I signed in years ago using my email handle.
I asked for ANY proof of what you claim to know
– THAT Treasury creates new money to spend for its payments …
-THAT Treasury never recycles ‘old (existing) money’ … why borrow?
-THAT Treasury ‘instructs’ the FED to buy its issues using the FOMA.
-THAT the CB stores ‘money’ in its accounts – ‘money’ being a dollar-denominated balance that contains real-economy “”purchasing power”” — to buy anything .
Of course I have to keep learning – what else is there(?) ….. thinking you already know everything —- from that egregious Mosler-Wray MMT ‘scoreboard’ logic.
My reasoning was the same photo in both answers. I also had problems with WordPress which stopped me from using my real name, said it was already used- so I had to modify my email to get accepted. That was annoying!
It’s also annoying that you are snippy about MMT, which is a simple
Factual explanation of how money works. Not an hypothesis which seems to be how you see it. It doesn’t mean that erroneous conclusions can’t be drawn but like arithmetic the laws don’t change because of errors we make.
I see you mention MMT authors and the like, so you should have seen some facts. They are often counterintuitive and against the grain of all we have heard since childhood, which can defeat logic!
So if you are genuinely wanting to understand, you’ll need to rethink your opposition to MMT [I prefer the term Modern Money Mechanics which was coined by the Reserve Bank of Chicago in 1963]
I can’t add sources as I’m not at home this week end. But I can give more data next week.
There is a reason why the tallest building in almost every State is a bank. Banking is a very lucrative business. The State that gives up this business to the private sector is being led by fools or criminals.
Banking is the master and commander of our economy, for certain.
They got their way 250 years ago. Fortunately/unfortunately it’s all coming to an end in the near future.
Michael Hudson talks about it often. Banks are killing the host [us]
Yes it could be “‘paid back’ in a single day” as you state if the Congress took the Constitutional right to issue debt free money to pay it off. However, that right was given up under Wilson in 1913 with the Federal Reserve Act. In order for the Congress to pay off the debt they must go to the Federal Reserve (a PRIVATE bank for profit) and borrow the money at interest to pay off the interest bearing notes. A perpetual debt increasing loop that must be repaid with the earning of Americans. If Congress did pay off the debt the result would be absolutely no money in circulation and the interest would still be owed. Do you really think the banks did not know what they were doing? The article exposes both ways to proceed: one being the continuation of the Fed and the other being the Constitutional way. This is our 3rd ‘Federal Reserve’ bank and it was kept at bay by Andrew Jackson for about 50 years. Warned by the likes of Thomas Jefferson, others tried to eliminate or mitigate it’s effects but were killed or attacked for their efforts; Lincoln, Garfield, Kennedy and Reagan, to name a few. I’m sure Trump knows the answer – but is he will to risk his life? The banking elite will not go easily and nothing in this county will change long term until the Fed is eliminated and the power to issue our nation’s money is again Constitutional and rests in the hands of the Treasury.
No the government is under no such obligation as you suggest. The Fed is never obliged to borrow. You cannot think that money is independent of the government which is effectively your opinion. The Federal government owns the money supply. It is free to do whatever it decides. The government therefore can buy any and every cost associated with its operations, As long as there is something for sale the government can create payments. This decision has zero to do with the federal reserve bank. The fed does what it is told by Treasury. It does not decide government policy. It manages the currency to control interest rates and inflation, already a full time occupation. It is also obliged to maintain full employment, at which it is not so successful.
Yours is a conspiracy theory.
We need to return to the Constitution. The Constitution says that Congress should control the printing and minting of money, not the banks/Federal Reserve. Give the money creation power back to the Treasury Dept. and Congress so we can have interest free money; not the debt money we now have.
All the constitution says is that the currency is entirely in the hands of the Government. That gives it a lot of latitude. It can choose whatever system it so desires. It can be stupid and borrow [from itself!] or set limits [Congress has done that]. A sensible way of managing the economy is set out in MMT, a fact based assessment [unlike the mainstream theology] Recommended!
Well said.
No, it is sovereignty that says money is in the hands of EVERY government, but the national laws, and the money statutes dictate ownership, operation and profit of whatever serves as Money in that System.
Our Constitutions says that Only Congress has the power to create and value money, but the FRAct and other laws allow the private bankers to issue ALL the money today. Pity.
MMT is a fool’s errand run amok.
How does “”it can be stupid, and borrow”” (never from itself (LOL), .
comport with “Our government is the monopoly issuer of its currency”?
The issuer does not borrow from anybody.
The lender is the bankers that create and issue all the money.
The borrower is you, me and our government.
The government is just another user of the private money system.
Read all that MMT crap years ago.
Warren Mosler is a fraud, the Pied Piper of the MMT cadre and their scribes.
Er, No. Not a sensible response to the issues and a rude and stupid belittling of MMT which disqualifies your judgment 100%. Well Done! Are you that competent all the time or was this just an aberration?
What a crock of nonsense. Try harder!
I said Warren Mosler is a fraud. Again. Why doesn’t he sue me, if it’s not true.
Need more proof?
I have it.
Obviously you are not worth it . Your opinions are considered not worth it.Take you pick? PS. You don’t have proof, it will be another opinion. Note the mainstream will be trying to fool you -and the rest of us. They don’t want us to know. They reckon we “can’t handle the truth” Mosler is a much smarter cookie than you.
I agree with you comments ejhr15 but what are some of the concrete approaches MMT offers (other than “employer of last resort ” in terms of managing the economy? It can be confusing.
That is a substantial topic! MMT describes the REAL world of economics, macroeconomics in particular. We live already in an MMT world, but the mainstream line in economics is not interested in reality. They readily admit to that, that they play models with each other and get off on equations etc of little use to anyone wanting to know what really does go on.
Lets start with just one “law” MMT understands. “Federal taxes are never used to pay for government spending”. Taxes are simply costs which the government says we have to pay – for many reasons, but not to fund anything. PS:- This is not the case with non-sovereign entities, like you or me or corporations or states like Greece or Kansas or Queensland. It’s unique to monetary sovereign nations.
Yes, I was inspired when I first encountered talks by Kelton, Wray, Mosler, etc. My impression is that they have freed up rigid and incorrect thinking with regard to influencing the money supply but for the most part, stop short of entering the policy side of the debate. While they go into detail on how the Fed and CB actually work, the conclusion I come to is that the current system is a square peg in a round hole. We should be considering radical alternatives being armed with the concept of true sovereign money creation. Again, other than employer of last resort, it seems MMT is somewhat agnostic on the politics and even satisfied with the current mechanisms. Am I wrong?
Politics influences everything it seems. MMT is agnostic, more so than the mainstream which has become a tool of the bankers and wealthy elite who wish the rest of the population to remain acceptably ignorant.
It’s a hard road to change people’s minds when the mainstream message has been repeated so often throughout life, Such as needing taxes to fund the government, which flies in the face that the government must spend first and then to people must earn some of that money before paying tax.
Yes it seems that there are several approaches out there that share the sovereign money basis. What I personally feel uncomfortable with is still allowing banks to create money, given the dire straits we find ourselves in. MMT claims to be, at best, “agnostic” on that.
By definition commercial banks actually create credit, which is a liability and has to be paid back. I’m not sure why bank created money is not in the national accounts, but it does balance to zero whereas CB money net credits money in to the economy and provides the funds the economy needs to grow.
I have a tough time seeing the practical difference between credit and CB money. Credit may balance to zero in some sort of static reality, but the $200,000 a bank may lend me to buy a house sits out there in the economy for decades before repayment. In 30 years that repaid loan isn’t even worth $200,000 due to inflation.
I would much rather see the democratization of money creation and not leave it to the “market”.
The federal government is empowered via the constitution to allow anyone they want to issue currency. They have absolute power.
Credit card companies, commercial banks etc are given this ability.
So when banks create a loan, they don’t have to deduct it from anywhere, it comes out of thin air and when marked up into the customer’s account it at that instant becomes money, liquid,M0.
The double entry book keeping event follows this money creation event.
“Whosoever controls the volume of money in any country is the absolute master of all industry and commerce. And when you realize that the entire system is very easily controlled, one way or another, by a few powerful men at the top, you will not have to be told how periods of inflation and depression originate.” President Garfield March 4, 1881, two weeks before he was assassinated. Ibid, p.70
Thanks. This is exceedingly prescient on Garfield’s part, and causes me to wonder – WHY is this OK with MMT ?
Hitler didn’t have to invade the world. He could have muddled through like most nations do.
The problem with the Trump/Bannon solution is that the government foots a large part of the bill but the private interests end up with ownership of the bridges and roads, etc.
The notion that the government might borrow from banks instead of ordinary deficit spending is a terrible idea. Yes, it would inject new money. But, it would be private debt held by the banks and it would have to be paid off. That would certainly put our grandchildren in peonage!! I hope that it never happens.
Good old fashioned deficit spending also creates new money by making deposits in bank accounts. The the “debt” is held by the private sector, but it would not have to be paid off – ever. Good old deficit spending increases private savings. It is money left over after taxes. National debt = private sector savings to the penny. It is the only savings net of debt in the private (nongovernment) sector.
I like the idea of very long bonds, or perpetual bonds as Ellen has spoken about. Both would avoid short term rollover problems. But, since so many bonds are tied up in rehypothecation as collateral, people want deficit spending to create more bonds for use as collateral. And they want a better interest rate, hence all the tantrums that are occurring.
[…] Ellen Brown Writer, Dandelion Salad The Web of Debt Blog December 7, […]
Here’s Ellen Brown’s article.
Karen Staser
So it’s better to borrow money at a cost then it is to simply print money and spend it?
What math is that?
Oh yeah, sorry, that’s when people who don’t work for a living think they deserve to put their hands on your money before you get paid.
Well it certainly is preferable to throwing people and nations up against the wall to see if they will stick, innit?
The private banks, including the Fed, rob us two ways. With inflation and interest…both a racket. And one more, with wars.
In reference to ‘Government borrowing from the countries own banks’, as Professor Werner says in the referenced video “it’s a stop-gap measure” See relevant section here > https://youtu.be/MechH0ebs_c?t=1h20m12s
Ireland paid up to 12% on bonds (Greece between 20% & 60%) while borrowing from banks would have been at less than 4%.
It is a stop-gap measure until public banks are established that can lend to the government, then as you know even the interest charged remains in public ownership and can be used for the public benefit.
The Central Bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the principles and form of our Constitution…I believe that the banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the Government at defiance. The issuing of power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs. If the American people ever allow the banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers occupied,” Thomas Jefferson, letter to Major Cartwright, June 5, 1824, “A History of Banking” , Stephen Mitford Goodson, p.60
It is amazing that so many people either work for the banks or think they know more than Jefferson, Kennedy, Lincoln and me.
Not so much the central banks, but the main banking families have run the worlds economies for profit. This goes back to 1700 which is the entire time our techno-industrial dynasty has lasted.
I wouldn’t be too worried about them. They are the parasites that are killing the host [Michael Hudson]. This society will fail, it is ordained now as we didn’t take action 50 years ago to slow down and become more sustainable.
Greece and Ireland gave up their sovereign currencies to join the Eurozone. Only countries with sovereign currencies can print as much as they need.
[…] “We’ll Look At Everything”: More Thoughts On Trumps $1 Trillion Infrastructure P… […]
[…] https://ellenbrown.com/2016/12/07/well-look-at-everything-more-thoughts-on-trumps-1-trillion-infrast… […]
[…] jobs, but has been vague about how that would be implemented. In an interesting post, Ellen Brown makes the argument that because the public private partnerships that so far been suggested won’t add new net […]
Ellen, a heads-up which may or may not be of interest.
Mpls MN is considering a city-owned bank. Boo hiss Wells Fargo and all of that.
The Council is open-mided enough to consider numbers.
They probably aren’t going to react favorably to passion, self-righteousness, or hyperbole and will actively resist your (to us out here) firey track record..
Numbers.
Hard, cold numbers.
Thoroughness that any City Auditor and/or Financial Plannner would drool over.
In fact, maybe taking politics out of it entirely and instead first gaining an advocate over in the Budget Office is the wisest course of action.
-D
>
[…] joebhed on “We’ll Look at Everything”: More Thoughts on Trump’s $1 Trillion Infrastructure Plan […]
[…] For Italy and other peripheral eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]
[…] For Italy and other “peripheral” eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks’ NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]
To the many who see government spending on infrastructure as a silver bullet for the economy and as a job creator I would like to raise a word of caution, It may be time for a “truth off’. More “bridges to nowhere” and wasted spending exist then the taxpayer could ever imagine. Often this spending falls short of creating real wealth for our country.
Where I live we recently replaced a major bridge that even the city’s leading newspaper said did not need replacing. The newspaper had gone on to state the bridge did not “need” to be replaced, but only needed minor repairs. In the end, they did not only replace the bridge but built a “super bridge” wasting a huge amount of money doing it. The article below is titled, “Infrastructure Spending No Silver Bullet”, it explores this subject in more detail.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/02/infrastructure-spending-no-silver-bullet.html
[…] For Italy and other “peripheral” eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks’ NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]
[…] For Italy and other “peripheral” eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks’ NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]
[…] For Italy and other “peripheral” eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks’ NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]
[…] — source ellenbrown.com […]
[…] In Italia e altri Stati “periferici” dell’eurozona, Werner suggerisce una impostazione a due rami: (1) la banca centrale dovrebbe comprare gli NPL sofferenti con il QE e (2) il governo dovrebbe prendere in prestito dalle banche e non dagli obbligazionisti. Il prestito dal mercato delle obbligazioni ingrassa i sottoscrittori ma non crea nuova moneta nella forma di credito bancario per l’economia. Il prestito dalle banche crea nuova moneta come credito bancario. (Vedi qua.) […]
[…] For Italy and other “peripheral” eurozone countries, Werner suggests a two-pronged approach: (1) the central bank should buy the distressed banks’ NPLs with QE, and (2) the government should borrow from the banks rather than from bondholders. Borrowing in the bond market fattens the underwriters but creates no new money in the form of bank credit for the economy. Borrowing from banks does create new money as bank credit. (See my earlier article here.) […]