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midnight

(26,624 posts)
Mon Jan 28, 2013, 11:01 PM Jan 2013

Most of Our Debt Is Fake - Let's Abolish It

The fact is, we live in a fiat currency system, meaning we can print an endless supply of dollars and not run up inflation, since the US dollar is the world's reserve currency. Most of the paper money in circulation comes from fractional reserve banking, where banks lend out money they don't have, which technically doesn't exist, to anyone who applies for a loan. When banks loan this money, they do so with a promise of real wealth to be taken if the bank's debt isn't repaid by a specified deadline. While it costs the borrower all the real wealth they staked as collateral if they don't pay back the debt owed to the bank, it costs the bank nothing to loan out the money they just created out of thin air. However, the bank turns a profit by collecting interest on these loans, regardless of the fact that they loaned out fictitious money. All commercial banks do this, hence why such a Ponzi scheme is legal. And US dollars are no longer backed by gold, so each dollar is essentially a note signifying debt owed to the private banks that control the Federal Reserve, which has been the sole issuer of US dollars since 1913.

Today, the Fed has lowered interest rates on our debt to 0% to keep the debt level artificially as low as possible to preserve the Ponzi scheme that the banks created with the signing of the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. The act states that the government must borrow money before the Fed can issue paper money, so if the interest rate was at 3% or 4%, the debt would soon rise to such an exponential level that the concept of paying it off would become laughable. But, since most of the national debt is owed to these same banks who engineered our debt, why not mint several trillion-dollar coins and pay off all the fake debt owed to the banks for good?

Coins are legal tender, and four quarters issued by the US Mint are interchangeable with one dollar issued by the Fed. So, if the US Mint made enough trillion-dollar coins to pay off the artificial debt created by fractional reserve banking, we could strike all of that debt and spend our tax dollars on jobs and infrastructure. And we would have plenty to pay debts that are owed to countries that actually lent us money, instead of debt created artificially by banks. In fact, as Chris Currie of Rhode Island suggested to me in an email, we could overhaul our paper currency system and issue US dollars electronically, doing away with the needless debt that the Fed creates when it issues paper money.

The short-term debt limit extension recently agreed upon by the House GOP won't do anything except kick this can down the road, where it becomes an even greater problem. Let's cast off the chains the bankers have on our economy and take it back.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/279-82/15742-most-of-our-debt-is-fake-lets-abolish-it

I like this idea-alot... It doesn't oppress the already oppressed and it seems as easy to do this as it is to keep the system we are using in place.. What can be more simple than issuing us dollars electronically?

19 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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FBaggins

(26,731 posts)
1. Sorry, the author doesn't know what he's talking about
Mon Jan 28, 2013, 11:16 PM
Jan 2013

Last edited Wed Feb 6, 2013, 12:18 PM - Edit history (1)

Ignoring the factual errors regarding how fractional banking works... The initial statement simply isn't true. A fiat currency does not mean that we can print whatever we like with no inflationary impact. The dollar had been the world's reserve currency for quite some time yet we've had many periods of high inflation.

midnight

(26,624 posts)
3. If you have a link that contradicts this as error please post..
Tue Jan 29, 2013, 12:01 AM
Jan 2013

But after listening to Elizabeth Warren, Brooksley Born this system in place is destroying most people...

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/view/

FBaggins

(26,731 posts)
4. Who needs a link?
Tue Jan 29, 2013, 12:10 AM
Jan 2013

I already proved the position. We were (for instance) far more the world's reserve currency in the 70s-80s... yet we had loads of inflation.

The very economic definition of inflation is a growth in the supply of money (taking velocity into account) that exceeds the growth in goods and services. Of course you can't just print whatever you want.

FBaggins

(26,731 posts)
14. For which?
Mon Feb 4, 2013, 04:01 PM
Feb 2013

Is it that you doubt that we were the world's reserve currency at the time... or that inflation was out of control?

midnight

(26,624 posts)
15. If you have a link to clarify the reasons why fractional banking is not a
Tue Feb 5, 2013, 11:46 PM
Feb 2013

system creating debt... Thanks...

FBaggins

(26,731 posts)
18. Now you're asking me to support a position I didn't state?
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 12:20 PM
Feb 2013

I don't need to provide a link clarifying why fractional banking is not a system creating debt... because it IS.

Or, better put, it's a system that uses debt to create money. But (pun intended) that's two sides of the same coin.

 

glowing

(12,233 posts)
2. That's the thing, it's all fake. The only real tangible value
Mon Jan 28, 2013, 11:33 PM
Jan 2013

is in people, work, contributions, and the environment in which we live and it's sustainability. Once enough people realize its all fake and being "poor" isn't necessary, more equitable living solutions and advancements can take place across the globe. This is why they are freaking out about the trillion dollar coin and people saying "hey, it's all pretty damn fake".

 

dkf

(37,305 posts)
5. So there is no social security or medicare trust fund after all?
Tue Jan 29, 2013, 12:57 AM
Jan 2013

It's just fake debt?

I wish people would make up their minds.

midnight

(26,624 posts)
12. dfk. Didn't see Social Security as debt in this article, and believe Social Security does not
Mon Feb 4, 2013, 03:32 PM
Feb 2013

contribute to debt.

Here is a good link:

midnight

(26,624 posts)
16. dkf if I understand your response, you're indicating that the ss funds were used as a piggy bank
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 12:00 AM
Feb 2013

aka trust funds?

 

dkf

(37,305 posts)
17. The SS fund holds treasuries, ious.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 02:47 AM
Feb 2013

If there were no trust funds then we would now have to cut social security payments because the payments into social security would be less than the benefits we pay out.

Or we would have to increase the payroll tax.

midnight

(26,624 posts)
19. "Debt held by trust funds does not have the same broader economic significance as debt held by
Fri Feb 8, 2013, 01:02 AM
Feb 2013

the public."

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3299

Is Trust Fund Debt Real if It’s Not Part of Debt Held by the Public?
This argument is incorrect: both measures of debt are important, but they measure different things.



"Debt held by the public is a measure of the federal government’s overall fiscal health. It represents money that must be borrowed and periodically refinanced in private credit markets; interest payments on that debt represent a current drain on government resources. If the specter of excessive debt led investors to lose confidence in U.S. government securities, federal interest costs could increase substantially, with potentially troubling implications for U.S. and world economies.
Debt held by Social Security, by contrast, provides information about the adequacy of the program’s dedicated financing. Debt held by trust funds does not have the same broader economic significance as debt held by the public. Since it does not need to be financed in private credit markets, it cannot lead to a refinancing crisis. As legal authority to spend money in the future, it is essentially similar to legal authority to meet spending commitments for other entitlement programs that are not financed through trust funds and are not included in measures of federal debt. In addition, an increase in trust fund balances that provides authority for higher Social Security expenditures in some distant year is not equivalent to issuing more publicly held debt to finance additional spending today. If additional spending authority leads to more federal borrowing at some time in the future, that borrowing will add to debt held by the public when that spending occurs.
As the 1938 Advisory Council on Social Security wrote in the passage quoted above, “The fulfillment of the promises made to the wage earners included in the old age insurance system depends upon, more than anything else, the financial integrity of the Government.” Protecting Social Security therefore requires not only assuring that the program itself is adequately financed but also putting the overall federal budget on a sustainable long-term course."

For all the money we pay into social security, this country should be able to live quite well without any austerity... Some one is being too greedy....

savageDOG

(1 post)
7. applytheremedy/ the fed will go nuts
Tue Jan 29, 2013, 12:43 PM
Jan 2013
https://www.facebook.com/hounDOGGIE/posts/436438246425691
because King George was also the King of France, and backed both sides of the American Revolution, and our Constitution agreed to pay all debts, even those incurred before the Revolution, and America was bankrupt- we have never paid the debt. abolish the debt? have you all forgotten Lincoln, and Kennedy?- both of them began printing interest free money to free ourselves from debt- both were shot in head within 60 days and in public. President Carter informed the media that he had an ANNOUNCEMENT and plan to make sweeping reforms in all phases of government- finance to CIA- and a failed assassination attempt sent him into seclusion- told his staff he had lost control of the government, made no changes and after his retirement denied SS protection [ he knew the threat was over]
in 1933, after gold was stolen from the people, with land, deeds and titles, a house resolution was designed to remedy the wrongful burden on Americans, this was passed into law, but neither the gov't nor bankers want anyone to know how to utilize this remedy.
Publish a Proclamation and Instructions of HOW TO Discharge Our Debts As Per HJR 192: http://sturly.com/6w1
The Federal Government took our lawful money out of circulation in 1933 but Congress had to provide the people a remedy. Public Law: "Chap. 48, 48 Stat. 112" under HJR 192 is that remedy and in part states that the Federal Government will discharge all of our debts, public and private, dollar for dollar. This has been one of the best kept secrets in this Bankrupt Nation.
They took everything including all property and titles to property and left us only w/ an ability to discharge debt and create money through our signature and they never bothered to tell us.
We create money when we apply for bank loans with our signature. It is our signature and credit in our ability to work that creates the money of account and this has been the case since 1933. The banks have a monopoly to our credit and for this "service" they charge principal and interest on non existent money all the time giving the impression they lent us their money and this is fraud because they never revealed where the money came from. This is true for Credit Card accounts and Mortgages.

AdHocSolver

(2,561 posts)
10. The Fed is a giant fraud perpetrated by and for the benefit of the banks.
Sat Feb 2, 2013, 04:22 AM
Feb 2013

The interest rate is kept artificially low by the Fed to allow the banks to reap extreme profits.

The banks pay depositors as little as 0.1 percent (0.001) for the use of their money while charging credit card customers 14 percent or more on their balances to borrow that same money. This is a ratio of 140 to 1.

The Fed is NOT a bank regulator. It is a giant theft machine.

K and R.

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