Just printing more money

Everyday, in every way, our government places more emphasis on “In God We Trust”. Lord, to whom shall we go?
Pax, Dennis

“without inflation”????????

Isn’t the very essence of inflation more dollars without more goods, services, assets, etc?

Douglas Adams in the Hitchhiker series wrote about the ancestors of humanity crashing on Earth and populating it. They tried to create an economy using tree leaves. Since the leaves were so plentiful, a relatively cheap item costing forests.

“They” say inflation is not on the rise. I wonder if “they” grocery shop.

This is dumb and a lie–and, at this point, a non-story to boot. Everyone knows that the Fed has been effectively printing money–hence, in part, current inflation. Who wrote this? I guess that’s what you get when an historian decides to write about economic affairs?

I mean, am I just missing something or is this guy actually claiming, as if it were a novel and serious idea, that the Treasury should simply “print”/create a few trillion extra dollars to “solve” all our problems–without inflation? I hope I’m missing something.

This is already official government policy. In fact, if you get any semi-serious economist into a room, they will acknowledge that the only possible way our national debt could ever be paid down is by this method. This is why, as well, the government has an official preference for inflation over deflation. The problem, of course, is the order of magnitude of the debt, and the necessary additional money supply. It can’t be done and maintain a 2-4% inflation rate — you run a real risk of ten times that level, especially once it starts to accelerate and, as a result, changes behavior of participants in the economy.

Moreover, this whole scheme would still do nothing unless we addressed our deficits and unfunded liabilities. COLA’s are built into most of our entitlements, so as we print more money we simultaneously create more liabilities due to inflation.

Historical note: The greenbacks were a disaster, and nearly decimated the U.S. economy.

The thing to remember is that currently, the Federal Reserve Bank creates money out of thin air, and then loans it to the government at interest. So right now we have debt and the threat of inflation. If Congress just printed it themselves, the effect would be the same except there would be no need to issue bonds or make interest payments.

I’m liking the sound of this, and I can see why the banking industry would hate it. No more borrowing free money from the fed at 0% and loaning it to the US Govt at 3%.

Everyone knows that the Fed has been effectively printing money–hence, in part, current inflation.

Of course that’s a given. “The Fed” is a private bank. What he’s proposing is having Congress do it instead of (or in addition to) the Fed.

Who wrote this? I guess that’s what you get when an historian decides to write about economic affairs?

“Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it…”

I mean, am I just missing something or is this guy actually claiming, as if it were a novel and serious idea, that the Treasury should simply “print”/create a few trillion extra dollars to “solve” all our problems–without inflation? I hope I’m missing something.

I’m not sure how you could have gotten that impression from a thorough reading of the article. He is not saying we should just print a few trillion extra dollars and be done with it. He addresses the inflation concern in detail and lays out a careful approach that starts small.

This is simply a “Lincoln did it, so it must be good” craptastic excuse for destroying what’s left of the credibility of the U.S. dollar. No matter how detailed the explanation this is simply creating more inflation – the monetary version of fighting fire with gasoline and oily rags soaked in kerosene. Stupid, stupid, stupid, and inexcusable from any historian who is even semi-responsible. Complete, sheer idiocy in bottle. As was noted above, greenbacks were disastrous for the U.S. economy and resulted in severe economic dislocation after the conclusion of the Civil War. It was only after the government stopped printing the greenbacks and returned to a gold-backed currency that our economy took off in the late 1870’s through the 1890’s (i.e., the Gilded Age).

Every time this has happened in U.S. history (Revolutionary War – remember the famous “not worth a Continental, 1820’s – the western states and their scrip, the Civil War greenback, our own Fed’s persistent devaluation of the dollar of almost 100% since 1913) we have faced deeper and more prolonged economic dislocation and depression than at any other time.

Better idea – have Congress exercise its legal tender privileges and allow gold, silver and other commodities to be legal. Propose to simply allow the dollar to be tied to a commodity base. And. Then. Walk. Away.

Hmmmmm. Not much of an economist or student of the history of the U.S. economy or banking, but one question I wonder about is how the Chinese (who already own a ton of debt) would like his solution? And if they didn’t, what might they do to persuade our government that it was a really bad idea?

Whatever we do, we’d better think hard about what other nations might do in response to any “brilliant” solutions that maybe did or didn’t work in the past.

Arguably, it is that very Legal Tender Act of 1862 that was the precursor to the eventual conception in 1913 of that “Creature of Jekyll Island” (The Federal Reserve).

Anyways, here’s just a snippet from you know who. 😉 Well, ok, more than a snippet, for anyone interested…

(Link: http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul619.html)

“…At this country’s founding, there was no government-controlled national currency. While the Constitution established the Congressional power of minting coins, it was not until 1792 that the US Mint was formally established. In the meantime, Americans made do with foreign silver and gold coins. Even after the Mint’s operations got underway, foreign coins continued to circulate within the United States, and did so for several decades.

On the desk in my office I have a sign that says: “Don’t steal — the government hates competition.” Indeed, any power a government arrogates to itself, it is loathe to give back to the people. Just as we have gone from a constitutionally-instituted national defense consisting of a limited army and navy bolstered by militias and letters of marque and reprisal, we have moved from a system of competing currencies to a government-instituted banking cartel that monopolizes the issuance of currency. In order to reintroduce a system of competing currencies, there are three steps that must be taken to produce a legal climate favorable to competition.

The first step consists of eliminating legal tender laws. Article I Section 10 of the Constitution forbids the States from making anything but gold and silver a legal tender in payment of debts. States are not required to enact legal tender laws, but should they choose to, the only acceptable legal tender is gold and silver, the two precious metals that individuals throughout history and across cultures have used as currency. However, there is nothing in the Constitution that grants the Congress the power to enact legal tender laws. We, the Congress, have the power to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, but not to declare a legal tender. Yet, there is a section of US Code, 31 USC 5103, that purports to establish US coins and currency, including Federal Reserve notes, as legal tender.

Historically, legal tender laws have been used by governments to force their citizens to accept debased and devalued currency. Gresham’s Law describes this phenomenon, which can be summed up in one phrase: bad money drives out good money. An emperor, a king, or a dictator might mint coins with half an ounce of gold and force merchants, under pain of death, to accept them as though they contained one ounce of gold. Each ounce of the king’s gold could now be minted into two coins instead of one, so the king now had twice as much “money” to spend on building castles and raising armies. As these legally overvalued coins circulated, the coins containing the full ounce of gold would be pulled out of circulation and hoarded. We saw this same phenomenon happen in the mid-1960s when the US government began to mint subsidiary coinage out of copper and nickel rather than silver. The copper and nickel coins were legally overvalued, the silver coins undervalued in relation, and silver coins vanished from circulation.

These actions also give rise to the most pernicious effects of inflation. Most of the merchants and peasants who received this devalued currency felt the full effects of inflation, the rise in prices and the lowered standard of living, before they received any of the new currency. By the time they received the new currency, prices had long since doubled, and the new currency they received would give them no benefit.

In the absence of legal tender laws, Gresham’s Law no longer holds. If people are free to reject debased currency, and instead demand sound money, sound money will gradually return to use in society. Merchants would have been free to reject the king’s coin and accept only coins containing full metal weight.”

Magical thinking… like a drunk drinking himself sober.

Weimar Republic anyone? Heck, you don’t have to go back that far; look at Zimbabwe today. It beggars believe that someone would suggest that the way out of our economic troubles is to get the government to print more fiat money. Astonishing.

Whatever we do, we’d better think hard about what other nations might do in response to any “brilliant” solutions that maybe did or didn’t work in the past.

Hmm, maybe they will cry.

Seriously, those who can, do. Any country with clever conscientious people and resources is going to go on about the business of thriving, not worry about trying to collect bad debts. Plenty of other nations have defaulted without the rest of the countries freaking out. What is the point of trying to get blood from a turnip? Smart folks don’t waste their time with that. They just move on.

The more I think of the debt, speculation, inflation, yada, yada, the more it makes me think that it is an elaborate psychological trick we have accidentally stumbled upon to keep the productive folks working and contributing under the illusion of getting ahead, when of course, not matter what we do, we just get closer to the end. But society would crumble if we all went nihilist and decided to just sit poolside.

@sg, #14

“…and contributing under the illusion of getting ahead, when of course, not matter what we do, we just get closer to the end.”
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Yes, the “illusion” is easy when all the bounty was purchased on credit, not to mention continuing to do so without ever being forced to ask how to pay the debt back–let alone the interest (other than to defer from paying back the Ferryman by printing more and more unbacked money worth less and less.) Granted, with the current inflation and super-inflation coming sooner than we think, that illusion will crumble. As John Adams said in a letter to Thomas Jefferson, “All the perplexities, confusion and distresses in America arise not from defects in the constitution or confederation, nor from want of honor or virtue, as much from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit, and circulation.”

But the silver-lining (if there is one) is that more and more people are waking up, starting to ask questions regarding the root causes (e.g., the Fed with it’s unsound money and Keynesian economics, which the Goldman Sachs of the world are more than happy to be in collusion with if they’ll let them in a mutual back-scratching relationship), causes which originally presented themselves as solutions to problems but now are revealed to be problems in need of solutions. They’re learning the basics of macro-economics; re-learning (if not learning for the first time no thanks to our public education system) basic Constitutional principles and wisdom of the founding fathers. They at least read/learn from the internet, if not from books, rather than zone out on the pundicy of whatever MSM news, whether it be advertised as left or right leaning. There is substantive enlightenment going on right now—I mean, 10 years ago few even knew anything about matters like the nature/function of money, the Federal Reserve, or even basic Constitutional principles. When is the last time a political candidate ever mentioned something so archaic-yet-wise as Bastiat’s “The Law” (a must read for any classical education curriculum) ever be mentioned in a televised debate, as we did recently (by “you know who”)??

For sure, we have the silly, misguided/mis-directed “Occupy” people who should at least be on the steps of the Fed first before Goldman Sachs, but not all are doing that who see the need for change that is fundamental, and not merely the typical cosmetic solutions most politicians keep spouting. I mean, when is the last time we’ve seen hundreds of college students from all over the country donate their whole Christmas vacation simply to come to Iowa just to canvass door-to-door for a candidate—not because of he was handsome or charismatic or had nice-hair (or eyebrows!) and seduced such youth into a personality cult, but simply because of the time-honored principles the uncomely candidate consistently promoted? Regardless of whether us older folk (who of course ‘assume’ older always means wiser) agree with all of the said candidates positions, the fact that so many of our “post-Boomers” generations are supporting him simply on the basis of his principles rather than on any photogenic, sweet-talking media appeal he has (which he admittedly doesn’t), is something to be praise, imo? Such a refreshing change from the “Style over substance” mentality/subjectivity (‘enthusiasm’) of the culture still dominated by the Boomers for the meantime both in society and sadly, also in the churches (e.g., Rick Perry and Obama are to politics what Joel Osteen and Rick Warren are to Christianity.)

For sure, personally as a confessional Lutheran Christian, I’m aware that there is no perfect utopia–kingsdom rise and kingdoms fall, and we dare not “put our trust in princes”. No other Savior than the Savior we have. Nevertheless, if/when the illusions of economic prosperity (and hence, national security) are finally shattered and this country does repeat history and falls like Rome, as we all end up eating with Chinese sticks, if eating at all, at least there were some who clearly understood why and tried to prevent it. But there is nothing wrong with hoping for mercy, for hoping that it is not too late to reverse the course…even if God comes tommorrow, we still can plant a tree today (Luther)…above all, not for merely materialistic/temporal benefit, but for the sake of the preservation/promotion of the Gospel until the Lord ends this age. Nevertheless, Maranatha…Thy Kingdom Come, and come quickly.

“Granted, with the current inflation and super-inflation coming sooner than we think, that illusion will crumble.”

My bet is on a deflationary event. There is so much bad debt, including credit default obligations in the hundreds of trillions of dollars, that will be defaulted on that regardless of how fast they print more money. Thats why all these EU banks are suffering liquidity problems. Its like throwing the money on a fire as soon as you print it.

Again, most of you are missing the crux of the argument. The Fed is already creating money in massive amounts. The U.S. Government then ends up borrowing this new money at interest. All other things being equal, why should our government borrow (and pay interest on) the new money instead of just creating and using it themselves?

We understand Joel. Monetizing the debt is a bad idea (it is truly evil, actually), no matter who prints the money.