An important fact about the economy

[AwakeAndAngry]

In history, there has never been a recession that has not followed a constriction of the money supply. There has also never been a constriction of the money supply that was not been followed by a recession.

So who controls the money supply?

The Federal Reserve is owned by a conglomerate of private banks.

If you don't comprehend fractional reserve banking, the means by which money is loaned into existence, and the fact that the federal reserve is privately owned you may not realize that the bank bailouts was a case of taxpayers money being used to guarantee the interest and capital repayments on money that was then loaned into existence as a debt.

The bank bailouts were a worldwide event, and without them the entire banking system would have collapsed.

Therefore, a huge number of tax payers around the world, borrowed money off banks, that didn't have it they just created it, to then bailout the banks and as a thank you we're paying the interest on it. Politicians around the world chose to do this rather than let capitalism do its work and kill off these failed, privately owned companies and let their shareholders take the hit.

As the father of fascism, Benito Mussolini, put it, fascism could be called corporatism - the perfect merger between corporation and state.

Unfortunately, it gets worse, the Swiss Institute of Technology did a study a few years ago. The looked at the top 40,000 corporations worldwide and found that they were two thirds owned by an inner circle of banks and that these banks had further control due to debt. Corporations need to compete and to this they use their resources for advertising, research and development, etc. One of those resources it the large loans they can take out from the banks. Typically, as a condition of these loans the bank puts one of it's own employees on the board of the company doing the borrowing. If this employee of theirs reports back anything they do not like the bank can pull the loan if need be. This would cause serious harm or more likely destroy the company, so they have them by the balls.

So it wasn't just the banking system that was bailed out, it was the entire corporate system.

If you follow the money, the corporations and the bank's international owners, using tax havens, are extracting huge amounts of money from a huge proportion of the world's population, especially Europe and the USA through a system that doesn't adhere to capitalism. There is little prospect of real large scale competition developing for obvious reasons.

This obviously gives the people that ultimately own the banks and through them own and control the corporations incredible power over many of the world's economies and consequently many of their politicians/governments even before you consider donations, lobbies, etc.

 

[Gimmesometruth]

In history, there has never been a recession that has not followed a constriction of the money supply. .

 

[AwakeAndAngry]

Thank you for your reply and chart. It is the rate at which money is being issued via loans, especially to the public, you need to look at, not how much money people already have and hold in one form or another. The constrictions are sudden, sharp shocks that would require a greater resolution of detail as well.

For example, during the credit crunch the banks dramatically reduced the amount of lending to one another let alone the public (credit card lending will probably have increased, but overall, especially mortgage lending, by banks that will have affected the amount of money being created declined. The bank bailouts technically increased the amount of money issued but this was primarily for the bailing the banks out and has been effectively hoarded and so the amount of money issued and used in the real economy reduced. In either case the shock caused by the sudden change in the amount of loans being issued had already happened. That was recent enough that people will remember that clearly resulted in a recession.

 

[Gimmesometruth]

Thank you for your reply and chart. It is the rate at which money is being issued via loans, especially to the public, you need to look at, not how much money people already have and hold in one form or another. The constrictions are sudden, sharp shocks that would require a greater resolution of detail as well.

For example, during the credit crunch the banks dramatically reduced the amount of lending to one another let alone the public (credit card lending will probably have increased, but overall, especially mortgage lending, by banks that will have affected the amount of money being created declined. The bank bailouts technically increased the amount of money issued but this was primarily for the bailing the banks out and has been effectively hoarded and so the amount of money issued and used in the real economy reduced. In either case the shock caused by the sudden change in the amount of loans being issued had already happened. That was recent enough that people will remember that clearly resulted in a recession.

Um, the basis of your theory, which has shifted from "constricting money supply correlates with recessions" to "constrictions on personal loans correlates with recessions" does not jibe with reality either, in the years 04 to 07 there was no real "constricting" of lending going on.....in fact, the problem was the opposite, there was so much loose money available that asset prices (housing) went nutz. The housing prices collapsed not because of a lack of available credit.....but because of a belief that prices had peaked, wages were not going to keep up with the increased mortgage costs..yadda yadda. It was classic bubble dynamics.

What you ought to focus on, IMHO, is personal debt levels, ala Steven Keen.