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Money: Fractional Reserve Banking Is Fraudulent

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nimble

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Fractional reserve is fraud and fiat and easily subject to inflation without end. The "money multiplier effect" is real, though the new and additional money which fractional reserve banking creates is not actual money, but fiduciary media or debt. By fiat, fiduciary media is treated as money.

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How is fractional reserve fraud if you agree to the exchange? Are IOU's fraud too?

If you are arguing what I think you are arguing, then you want a bank to be like a stock broker, not a banker. You want a bank to take your gold (REAL MONEY), loan it out with interest, while you cannot redeem your gold, because it is not there, the bank loaned it out, then when the bank collects the loan it gives you a cut. That is not banking at all. With real banks you can withdraw your money, with fractional reserve banking not backed by the government the bank would not have anything to give you when you came to claim your money, yet they loaned it out. With government, they just print the bills to shut you up, but without government what is the bank going to do, make some more gold, so you dont start a banking panic?

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You guys do realize that all gold is the same, right? Just like every dollar is worth the same amount? When you open a bank account, it's not like you're putting your dollars/gold into a vault and saying "ok, anytime I want, I'll come by and you give me the stuff in THIS vault- my very own gold and money." It's more like one giant vault that everyone shares. You throw 10 dollars, or gold bars, or whatever, onto the pile, in exchange for the right to come by later and take 10 dollars (plus interest) back.

So it's not like fractional-reserve banks grant two people ownership of the same thing. It's more like the bank owns what's deposited there, and then it loans it out to people who then own it exchange for a promise to pay it back. After it does that, it has more agreements to pay back money that it has deposits to pay back. Let's say $10,000,000 has been deposited in a band, and $5,000,000 loaned out. If every single depositer comes simultaneously, the bank will be in trouble, because it will have promised to pay back more than it can. That's when insurance comes in, and the risk (which will always exist, no matter what you do) of losing your savings. The system works because people don't do that- they don't TRY to ruin their own bank! The banks have very cleverly calculated how much they will probably need to repay at any one time, and keep only that much in actual capital (whether that capital is gold, paper, or electronic doesn't matter here).

On the question of legality, it seems like there's usually a simple way to determine this. Is anyone using force, or would force only be needed to make it stop?

I see no force in this sort of transaction. The only possible "Force" I could see would be if one bank decided to print money like mad and devalue the money supply, but there's an easy solution to that- have all banks issue different money. Then it would be impossible for one bank to devalue another's currency, just like it is impossible for one country to create inflation in another. I suppose you might have a problem of one's own bank davaluing your currency, but that would be easy to stop- just sign a contract with your bank where they would agree not to let their gold reserve go below some percentage of what they loaned out. Any violation of this could rightly be persecuated as fraud.

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Why not just bypass the middle man.  You can have a 100% reserve account right now.

Buy a safe.

Amen.

100% reserve bank accounts would have a negative interest rate which many people would find unattractive.

What is it with you people and thinking that our money is backed by gold? We haven't had a gold standard for ages. Since there is no upper limit to the amount of money that can exist, no standard for it, it wouldn't be fraudulent to pull money out of thin air.

If the government can't pay back a loan they just fire up the printing presses, and since there is no standard for the dollar there is absolutely nothing untowards about that. Yes it will increase inflation, but that's the way our government has operated for decades.

On a side note I would absolutely jump for joy if we would reinstate some sort of gold or silver standard for the dollar.

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So it's not like fractional-reserve banks grant two people ownership of the same thing.  It's more like the bank owns what's deposited there, and then it loans it out to people who then own it exchange for a promise to pay it back.  After it does that, it has more agreements to pay back money that it has deposits to pay back.  Let's say $10,000,000 has been deposited in a band, and $5,000,000 loaned out.  If every single depositer comes simultaneously, the bank will be in trouble, because it will have promised to pay back more than it can. 

You said it perfectly, if everyone comes back at once the bank is in trouble, it promised something it can NEVER PROVIDE (never is the key word)--money to all depositors on demand. What business can get away with promising something it can never provide to its customers. It is literally impossible for the bank to ever meet all its obligations. Businesses do use IOUs, but businesses have the means to pay the money back in real terms since they are producing something. Eventually they can meet their obligations. The fractional reserve bank merely inflates the money supply artificially with paper IOUs or bank notes, and expects the producer (loanee) to bear the sole weight of this fraud, by paying in the forms of interest on principle and through inflation. And then the bank gives the depositor a cut of the crime.

Think about it, if there is nothing wrong with fractional reserve banking, then why can't the fractions be smaller. Why keep 10% in reserves, why not keep 5%, or why not keep 1%, and so on ad infinitum. The only reason for not making the reserves smaller is because they can get caught if they make them too small, thus exposing the fraud. Also, no one as answered, how fractional reserve banking is beneficial to an economy. Why would there be a market for it? It causes inflation (not good). It causes the business cycle (not good). You may say that an increase in the money supply causes aggregate investment demand to grow, and thus letting business invest, but as any economist will tell you, more money doesn't equal more prosperity. Even though the money supply increased, production, labor and capital may have not. It doesn't matter what quantity of money you have in an economy it works the same way, prices will be determined by the ratio of money to output. More money equals higher prices, less money equals lower prices. Both still have the same economic REAL output. The increase in the money supply caused by a fractional reserve bank only has a psychological effect, not an economic one.

100% reserve bank accounts would have a negative interest rate which many people would find unattractive.

I find this interesting. Why do you think so? That is how banks used to work. Also, that is how the whole warehousing industry works. People pay to have their valuables stored in a warehouse. Money is valuable and would work like any other commodity on the market, people would pay to store it.

Last question I pose to everyone...if money is a commodity (gold) and the bank note is a representation of the total stock of that commodity, why would printing more paper notes than there is gold not result in a loss of value for the bank notes? Wouldn't the value of the bank notes be determined by the ratio of bank notes to actual money (gold), just like any other things value is determined (just like the price bread would be determined by the total quantity and demand of bread relative to the stock of money)? So if the total amout of gold in the economy was 10 pounds, and there were bank notes printed to represent 100 pounds, wouldn't the value of the bank notes fall since they are being currently overvalued by the bank? (Just so you know the bank notes would lose 90% of their said-value because there exists 90 pounds gold representing bank notes than there is actual gold, and the gold is all that matters since it is the real medium of exchange, NOT paper)

Edited by nimble
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Yes, true, it is generally unlikely that all the customers of a bank will conspire to ruin the banking system. Of course, speaking probabilistically, it might happen, but it's nothing to worry about, right?

Except that it's happened many times: the many deflation-depressions that have plagued the United States around the turn of the century to the Great Depression. What else do you think caused reality to punish the irrationality of inflation so brutally?

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Let's say you that you have a friend coming into town, and for some reason, you decide to give him money. However, you have no money, and will not have any until you get paid on friday. Your friend gets in on saturday. Is it fraudalent to promise to pay your friend when he arrives, despite not having the money to do so currently, since you know that you'll have the money for him when he does come? Of course not. You'll be able to meet your obligations in full when it comes time to pay them.

Likewise, even though a bank might not have enough money to pay all its obligations at once, it knows that it will have enough money to pay them when it needs to. I'm sure they can calculate what the odds are of needing any given amount of money at any given time, so all they have to do is decide what an acceptable level of risk is. Like, if they hold 90% of their deposits in gold, they'll have a 99.9999999% chance of being able to pay back depositors; if they hold 50% in gold, they'll have a 99% chance, and so on. That's why they don't decide to just hold 1% or whatever (I have no idea how much they would actually need, but I'm sure any reputable bank would be extremely cautious about this). I guess you could argue that it's fraudalent to run a business where there's only a chance of being able to meet your obligations, but the same is true of any business. For example, there's a CHANCE that your bank could be blown up by terrorists tomorrow. It doesn't matter whether the bank is fractional reserve or not, there's still a chance that it'll get blown up with your life's savings. I'd hardly say that relying on statistics makes something fraudalent(almost any industry does, to some extent).

The reason fractional reserve banking is commonplace, when it used to be nonexistant, is because it IS beneficial to the economy-it makes money for all involved. The reason it doesn't produce inflation is because it only works if the bank makes good loans. If a bank loans money to a successful business, the business grows, adding more real value to the economy. At some point down the line, it even allows some mining company to produce more gold. If the business goes bankrupt, the loan is not repaid, and the bank takes a hit, so the amount of money and actual value are reduced together.

Finally, the reason bank notes would not decline in value is because value is determined by what you can get with something, not simply by the ratio of that thing to the money supply. If the bank is smart, than any of its bank notes can, at any time, be exchanged for that amount in gold. Not ALL of them can, but ANY of them can, and thus ALL of them retain their value. In your example of 100 pounds of notes for 10 pounds of gold, it doesn't work, because the values are so low. It would be very likely that some rich person would acquire more than 10 pounds of bank notes, and try to trade them in. But if the numbers are big enough, it works, because no one would withdraw, say, a million pounds of gold in one whack. And if you did want to do that, all you'd have to do is give the bank warning, or space it out over time. I believe most banks have a rule that they're not required to give out more than some amount (I think it's $10,000, but maybe that's just my bank) in cash at any one time, so as to prevent things like that from happening. Not to mention the insurance that all banks have...

I'm afraid I don't know the reason behind the depressions of the early 20th century. If I had to venture a guess, I'd say it was because the quick expansion of the time combined with the first, unexpected, government interfernce, made things very volitile, but I really don't know, and I'm sure it's more complicated than any one issue.

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Let's say you that you have a friend coming into town, and for some reason, you decide to give him money.  However, you have no money, and will not have any until you get paid on friday.  Your friend gets in on saturday.  Is it fraudalent to promise to pay your friend when he arrives, despite not having the money to do so currently, since you know that you'll have the money for him when he does come?  Of course not.  You'll be able to meet your obligations in full when it comes time to pay them.

Likewise, even though a bank might not have enough money to pay all its obligations at once, it knows that it will have enough money to pay them when it needs to.  I'm sure they can calculate what the odds are of needing any given amount of money at any given time, so all they have to do is decide what an acceptable level of risk is.  Like, if they hold 90% of their deposits in gold, they'll have a 99.9999999% chance of being able to pay back depositors; if they hold 50% in gold, they'll have a 99% chance, and so on.  That's why they don't decide to just hold 1% or whatever (I have no idea how much they would actually need, but I'm sure any reputable bank would be extremely cautious about this).  I guess you could argue that it's fraudalent to run a business where there's only a chance of being able to meet your obligations, but the same is true of any business.  For example, there's a CHANCE that your bank could be blown up by terrorists tomorrow.  It doesn't matter whether the bank is fractional reserve or not, there's still a chance that it'll get blown up with your life's savings.  I'd hardly say that relying on statistics makes something fraudalent(almost any industry does, to some extent).

The reason fractional reserve banking is commonplace, when it used to be nonexistant, is because it IS beneficial to the economy-it makes money for all involved.  The reason it doesn't produce inflation is because it only works if the bank makes good loans.  If a bank loans money to a successful business, the business grows, adding more real value to the economy.  At some point down the line, it even allows some mining company to produce more gold.  If the business goes bankrupt, the loan is not repaid, and the bank takes a hit, so the amount of money and actual value are reduced together.

Finally, the reason bank notes would not decline in value is because value is determined by what you can get with something, not simply by the ratio of that thing to the money supply.  If the bank is smart, than any of its bank notes can, at any time, be exchanged for that amount in gold.  Not ALL of them can, but ANY of them can, and thus ALL of them retain their value.  In your example of 100 pounds of notes for 10 pounds of gold, it doesn't work, because the values are so low.  It  would be very likely that some rich person would acquire more than 10 pounds of bank notes, and try to trade them in.  But if the numbers are big enough, it works, because no one would withdraw, say, a million pounds of gold in one whack.  And if you did want to do that, all you'd have to do is give the bank warning, or space it out over time.  I believe most banks have a rule that they're not required to give out more than some amount (I think it's $10,000, but maybe that's just my bank) in cash at any one time, so as to prevent things like that from happening.  Not to mention the insurance that all banks have...

I'm afraid I don't know the reason behind the depressions of the early 20th century.  If I had to venture a guess, I'd say it was because the quick expansion of the time combined with the first, unexpected, government interfernce, made things very volitile, but I really don't know, and I'm sure it's more complicated than any one issue.

First, Rand would be very appalled by this forum's view of fractional reserve banking.

Second, tell me then what is the total of fiduciary media (Paper) at any one point of time in a fractional reserve system?And at that same time tell me how much real money (gold) there is in the market? If there is more paper than gold, someone is inflating the economy, even if its not a government, it still isnt right.

Third, NO ONE HAS ANSWERED WHAT BENEFITS HAVING MORE MONEY IN AN ECONOMY HOLDS!!!!! You keep claiming that there are some, but never state any.

Lastly, I guess we don't need to argue about this, if a free market even allowed fractional reserve banking, its notes would not be worth anything more than the gold that backs them on the free market. So even if you were allowed to practice fractional reserve banking, the notes wouldn't be traded as highly as their face value states, so it doesn't even matter that you would be allowed to practice it, because the market would fix the problem.

Oh and in response to the friend analogy. You are misrepresenting the analogy. A fractional reserve bank gaurantees that "All of its depositors may redeem their deposits on demand." Yet, there is never a period of time where the bank can make good on its promise. It is literally impossible. But the point you are missing is not whether the bank can make good on its promises, but the fact that there would exist more paper (fake money/fiduciary media) than there is real money (gold). This means that the bank can never pay off all its debts IN GOLD. Simply because there is not enough gold to back all the paper. Every bank note is a bank debt, every gold bar is a bank asset. If there are more bank notes than gold bars in an economy, it makes it literally impossible for the banks to pay off their debts, thus the fraud. Unless people are willing to take paper rather than gold, and in that case, paper would be the medium of exchange and not gold, so why even have any gold standard at all?

Edited by nimble
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pi-r8,

Your problem is that you seem to understand business and finance, balance sheets, and mutually beneficial contracts. The general points you make have been made before, but there are some people here who appear to be immune to inductive arguments, and instead focus on rationalistic repetition of Rothbard's attack on economic freedom in banking. From my perspective, they are indistinguishable from trolls, but feel free to give yourself a mental workout.

Edited by A.West
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pi-r8,

Your problem is that you seem to understand business and finance, balance sheets, and mutually beneficial contracts. The general points you make have been made before, but there are some people here who appear to be immune to inductive arguments, and instead focus on rationalistic repetition of Rothbard's attack on economic freedom in banking. From my perspective, they are indistinguishable from trolls, but feel free to give yourself a mental workout.

I am saying, you can use fractional reserve banking, but what good does it do, if the value of that bank's fiduciary media goes down to the amount of gold that backs it, which is what will happen in a free market, just like it did before govt stole banking. It would make the fractional reserve process moot. Secondly, no one has ever addressed my question, WHAT BENEFITS DOES FRACTIONAL RESERVE BANKING HAVE? The amount of money in the economy does not matter, prices are just a ratio of gold to output, so whether the bank prints more or less bank notes, it won't change real production and output. The only thing it can do is inflate the money supply, and make prices rise, which isn't too bad if they don't over do it.

Lastly, Mises took this stance, not just Rothbard. And Mises was who Rand recommended for economics. I like how an Objectivist forum ignores Rand's advice on economics.

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pi-r8, if the friend can wait until Saturday, when he actually gets the money, to begin spending it, then it is not fraud. But that's not how fractional reserve banking works: in essence, it involves spending money which does not exist - how is it then accepted as money? by fiat.

In fact, if at one point in time there is a person with 10 oz gold on hand, and he deposits in the bank and receives a bank note for the sum of 10 oz gold, and the bank (on a 50% reserve standard) then loans 5 oz gold to another person, mailing him a bank note for the sum of 5 oz gold, then after the bank makes the loan there is an additional 5 oz gold fiat money in the economy. That's inflation.

Fractional reserve banking is commonplace because the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation protects bankers and depositors from the effects of their fractional reserve banking. If the system did not have the blessing and the protection of government, it could not exist.

Perhaps you don't understand how prices work, but here's a little explanation. Total spending in dollars in a certain year in the economy is equal to the total number of dollars in circulation in that year (the supply of money) times the average number of times any particular dollar is spent in that year (the velocity of money). Total spending is also equal to aggregate demand, which is equal to average price level times aggregate supply. As the bank injects 50% more fiat money into the economy, total spending rises 50%, aggregate demand rises 50%, aggregate supply remains constant, and the general price level falls 33%. Ratios of prices, however, remain constant.

"Expansion" - monetary expansion, ie, inflation - does very well explain the cause the depressions. Fractional reserve banking is expansionary.

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Secondly, no one has ever addressed my question, WHAT BENEFITS DOES FRACTIONAL RESERVE BANKING HAVE?

First, it does not matter to legality whether it benefits anyone. If it does not violate anyone's rights, it should be allowed, even if it is useless.

However, there are benefits. Suppose there are two forms of money in circulation: (1) gold coins; and (2) FBNs ("fraudulent" bank notes). And suppose that I am selling a tractor. Someone comes to me and offers me some gold coins. I am willing to sell to him, but my profit would be small. But before I do, a second person arrives and offers me some FBNs which he borrowed at the First Fractional Bank. If I can use the FBNs to buy more than I could with the gold coins, then I would profit more by selling to him.

If the First Fractional Bank does a good job of selecting people to whom to lend FBNs, then they will profit from the interest they get on their loans. The borrower will profit by having the opportunity to buy my tractor and use it to create more wealth than the man who would have bought it with the gold coins. And I profited by selling my tractor at a higher price than otherwise.

If any of us was mistaken in his judgment, then he will suffer a loss which will deter him from doing it again.

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First, it does not matter to legality whether it benefits anyone.  If it does not violate anyone's rights, it should be allowed, even if it is useless.

However, there are benefits.  Suppose there are two forms of money in circulation:  (1) gold coins; and (2) FBNs ("fraudulent" bank notes).  And suppose that I am selling a tractor.  Someone comes to me and offers me some gold coins.  I am willing to sell to him, but my profit would be small.  But before I do, a second person arrives and offers me some FBNs which he borrowed at the First Fractional Bank.  If I can use the FBNs to buy more than I could with the gold coins, then I would profit more by selling to him.

If the First Fractional Bank does a good job of selecting people to whom to lend FBNs, then they will profit from the interest they get on their loans.  The borrower will profit by having the opportunity to buy my tractor and use it to create more wealth than the man who would have bought it with the gold coins.  And I profited by selling my tractor at a higher price than otherwise.

If any of us was mistaken in his judgment, then he will suffer a loss which will deter him from doing it again.

Your mistake was assuming FBNs would be worth as much as gold. The FBNs would be worth whatever fraction of gold they had backing them, or worth their amount as paper, which ever is higher. If the bank has 100 oz of gold, and 1000 FBNs, each FBN would be worth only 1/10th of its face value in a free market, where government couldn't enforce its fake value. There are many historic examples of this, such as any banking panic.

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Responding to y_feldblum for my own reasons rather than an expectation that y_feldblum will gather any insight from my comments:

But that's not how fractional reserve banking works: in essence, it involves spending money which does not exist - how is it then accepted as money? by fiat
No, that's only the case when central banks force acceptance of money.

Fractional reserve banking is commonplace because the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation protects bankers and depositors from the effects of their fractional reserve banking. If the system did not have the blessing and the protection of government, it could not exist.

False. Banking systems involving fractional reserves have thrived over long periods in various countries without deposit insurance.

As the bank injects 50% more fiat money into the economy, total spending rises 50%, aggregate demand rises 50%, aggregate supply remains constant, and the general price level falls 33%. Ratios of prices, however, remain constant.

Since you've figured out exactly what the economy does, it seems you should go into economic forecasting. Have you tested your theory on any actual historical datasets? Why would spending and demand rise 50%? After all, the orignal gold depositor presumably doesn't want to spend that money, but rather would prefer to earn interest on his savings by leaving it in his account. Why do you presume supply remains constant - after all a great deal of bank lending is for the purpose of expanding business capacity. And why would price ratios remain constant, if a depositor is cutting, say, consumer spending in return for interest payments, while a borrower is redeploying those savings into a purchase of, say, capital equipment?

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Responding to y_feldblum for my own reasons rather than an expectation that y_feldblum will gather any insight from my comments:

After all, the orignal gold depositor presumably doesn't want to spend that money, but rather would prefer to earn interest on his savings by leaving it in his account.

He is not earning interest (gold)--he is earning paper FBNs.

Why do you presume supply remains constant - after all a great deal of bank lending is for the purpose of expanding business capacity. 
It's loans aren't made with real money (gold), but are made with unbacked paper FBNs. And thus it distorts markets to artificially expand more than they would have, but when everyone realizes that banks have overextended credit, everyone pulls their money out, and thus a bust. This is known as the business cycle. Greenspan mentioned this in his article in CUI, however the business cycle is nothing to aspire for. Without banks creating industry bubbles, all of the economy would steadily grow at the normal rate of real growth--no more booms and busts.

And why would price ratios remain constant, if a depositor is cutting, say, consumer spending in return for interest payments, while a borrower is redeploying those savings into a purchase of, say, capital equipment?

They wouldn't remain equal, you would have 1000% increase in the money supply (if the fractional reserve were 1:10) and you might have a 3-20% GDP increase, whatever ratios there were before would be thrown out the window at this point.

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Edited by nimble
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I have a few questions for you A West.

First, in your fractional reserve system would every bank note with a face value of 1oz of gold, actually have 1oz of gold, SOMEWHERE in the economy?

If no, then where do those slips of paper derive their value from?

Why value them any more than any other peice of paper, if they are not backed by gold?

It would be like playing the lottery, your slip might have gold behind it, it would be like a 10% chance.

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I have a few questions for you A West.

First, in your fractional reserve system would every bank note with a face value of 1oz of gold, actually have 1oz of gold, SOMEWHERE in the economy?

If no, then where do those slips of paper derive their value from?

Why value them any more than any other peice of paper, if they are not backed by gold?

It would be like playing the lottery, your slip might have gold behind it, it would be like a 10% chance.

1)Every bank note would be backed by some gold held as a reserve against short term redemptions, plus valuable productive economic assets which, if need be, could be converted into more than the remaining amount of gold, over time.

2)Their claims on productive assets in the real economy.

3)Because they represent claims on productive assets in the economy.

4) Because neither paper nor gold are valuable as money, intrinsically, but rather have value because they can be exchanged for real economic goods.

If only gold represented economic wealth, then fractional reserve banking might be playing the lottery. But the intermediation of savings into investment is a positive sum game, and 99 ounces of gold plus a bread factory is generally worth more than 100 ounces of gold.

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Because neither paper nor gold are valuable as money, intrinsically, but rather have value because they can be exchanged for real economic goods.

This is why I cannot understand why the process of fractional reserve banking is useful. The quantity of the medium of exchange does not matter, so why does the bank have to create more paper money, than there exists real gold money to back it? Printing more money does not increase production (at least not for long, before the boom dies and the bust comes). All it can possibly do is inflate prices, which is bad , and it creates business cycles, which are bad, and undesirable.

But we aren't making any process here. All I have to say is that IF we ever have a truly free market, I will not be accepting any fractional reserve notes as trade.

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But we aren't making any process here. All I have to say is that IF we ever have a truly free market, I will not be accepting any fractional reserve notes as trade.

All I can say is, if you do somehow acquire some, I'll be happy to take those fractional reserve notes off your hands for what you say their real value is. If the bank only has 10% of its notes in gold, you'd say they'd be worth 10% face value, right? Well, I'll cut you a deal, I'll pay you 20% of their face value, in gold!

... Then I"ll go down to your bank and redeem them for their full face value in gold.

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Responding to A. West:

- By "by fiat", I am referring to such institutions as legal tender.

- The FDIC greatly encourages fractional reserve banking by preventing the otherwise inevitable bank failures which fractional reserve banking causes. I did not mean to imply that without merely the FDIC fractional reserve banking could not exist; however, without the government institution and regulation of money, it could not exist. Because, through and through, it is fraud. And reality always punishes irrationality.

- MV represents total spending in the economy by definition. Holding the velocity of money V constant and multiplying the supply of money M by 1+i causes total spending to be multiplied by 1+i. Total spending in the economy, by definition, represents the total price of everything purchased, or, aggregate supply times the average price level, which is also the definition of aggregate demand. Inflation causes no immediate change in aggregate supply, so with inflation i, aggregate demand and prices are multiplied by 1+i as well. In my previous post, I did make the mistake of asserting that with inflation of 50% the average price level falls by 33%; that's incorrect: the average price level rises by 50% as well.

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All I can say is, if you do somehow acquire some, I'll be happy to take those fractional reserve notes off your hands for what you say their real value is.  If the bank only has 10% of its notes in gold, you'd say they'd be worth 10% face value, right?  Well, I'll cut you a deal, I'll pay you 20% of their face value, in gold!

... Then I"ll go down to your bank and redeem them for their full face value in gold.

If I accepted them at 10% of its face value from some other dope, I'd be more than happy to get rid of them at 20% IN GOLD. And lets hope the bank still has enough gold to give you its full face value, because if it does, it both of us will make out like bandits in this process.

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