The causes of the gold inflow that fueled the post-1933 recovery, and especially the part played by FDR’s decision to devalue the dollar.
Money & Banking
The New Deal and Recovery, Part 6: The National Bank Holiday
During the opening days of March, 1933, the U.S. economy resembled a stricken body slowly bleeding out, its organs failing one by one. The Federal Reserve System was hemorrhaging gold, and entire state banking systems were shutting down one after another. I
The New Deal and Recovery, Part 5: The Banking Crisis
To understand how the world’s largest economy ended up shutting-down its entire banking system, one must first be aware of a long-standing defect of that system and of how it led, first to the proliferation of small and under-diversified banks, and then to as many bank failures.
Scottish Banks and the Bank Restriction, 1797-1821, Part 3
Blame the Bankers, Not Freedom in Banking
Scottish Banks and the Bank Restriction, 1797-1821, Part 2
That there was widespread support for the Scottish bank suspension did not, however, mean that the suspension left the Scottish public unscathed.
Scottish Banks and the Bank Restriction, 1797-1821, Part 1
Does the Scottish suspension suggest that fractional reserve banking is, inconsistent with genuine freedom in banking, including the consistent honoring of bank customers’ property rights?
Laffer Gets Laughable
If we can’t kill it entirely, we should be thinking about ways to make the Fed less political, not more.
The Financial Crisis: Lessons Not Learned
The financial crisis of 2008-9 — accompanied by the Great Recession was caused by government intervention, mainly in mortgage finance and the housing sector.
What Makes Money Trustworthy?
I don’t trust politicians, generally, but I especially don’t trust them with money. Since the U.S. went off the gold standard, the dollar has lost 80 percent of its value.
Federal Reserve System: America’s Leading Socialist Institution with Few Opponents
At a time when the appeal of and demands for a new “democratic” socialism seem to have caught the imagination of many among the young and are reflected in the promises of a good number of political candidates running for high office, there is one already-existing...
The Production of Money Isn’t (Necessarily) the Production of Wealth
The creation of money doesn’t create wealth, unless money itself is wealth — as it was when it was gold and silver.
John Allison on the Financial Crisis
How the government fundamentally caused the financial meltdown of 2008.
Macro Aggregates Hide the Real Market Processes at Work
Government planners fail to “manage” market economies as the indicators they use are themselves false signals hiding from view the reality of the complex market system.
Interest Rates Need to Tell the Truth
In the middle of July 2018, President Donald Trump said in an interview that he was “not happy” with the Federal Reserve nudging up interest rates and threatening economic growth in the United States. At the recent Jackson Hole, Wyoming, meeting of global central bank...
The Myth that Central Banks Assure Economic Stability
What is the fundamental issue is: monetary central planning – with its embarrassingly awful one hundred year track record with paper monies – or getting government’s direct or indirect hand off the handle of the monetary printing press.
European Bank HSBC Abandons Financing Fossil Fuels
Banks to stop financing fossil fuel development: Sound investment decisions vs. virtue signaling?
Books: The Moral Case for Finance
The essential moral case for finance that Brook and Watkins present is that finance is good by the standard of human flourishing.
Austrian Monetary Theory vs. Federal Reserve Inflation Targeting
The phantom of “inflation targeting.”
A Monetary Policy Primer, Part 11: Last-Resort Lending
Forget about monetary policy for a moment or two, and imagine, instead, that you’re back in 6th grade. You and your classmates are about to go on a camping trip, involving some strenuous hiking, and lasting several days.
A Monetary Policy Primer, Part 10: Discretion, or a Rule?
Forget about monetary policy for a moment or two, and imagine, instead, that you’re back in 6th grade. You and your classmates are about to go on a camping trip, involving some strenuous hiking, and lasting several days.
Government Monopoly Money vs. Personal Choice in Currency
Greater monetary freedom would not only give every citizen a legal right to protect and secure his income, wealth and market transactions from abusive mismanagement of the government’s monopoly monetary printing press. It could also serve as a check on the degree of such government abuse.
Wrong Lessons from Canada’s Private Currency, Part 3
The real lessons to be learned from Canada’s 19th-century currency system.
Wrong Lessons from Canada’s Private Currency, Part 2
The real lessons to be learned from Canada’s 19th-century currency system.
Wrong Lessons from Canada’s Private Currency, Part 1
The real lessons to be learned from Canada’s 19th-century currency system.
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