Money as Debt

[Sapiens]

Paul Grignon's 47-minute animated presentation of "Money as Debt" tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it ... all » is being created. It is an entertaining way to get the message out. The Cowichan Citizens Coalition and its "Duncan Initiative" received high praise from those who previewed it. I recommend it as a painless but hard-hitting educational tool and encourage the widest distribution and use by all groups concerned with the present unsustainable monetary system in Canada and the United States.

[grapejelly]

Re: Money as Debt

this is a great video when it describes how the world works. But the prescription for a better way are quite flawed. The usual big government if-only-government-issued-money-without-paying-interest-to-the-big-banks bogus garbage. If this prescription were followed and worked, then the USSR and China would have been glorious workers paradises for sure and we'd all be happy little communists.

[Tet]

Re: Money as Debt

this is a great video when it describes how the world works. But the prescription for a better way are quite flawed. The usual big government if-only-government-issued-money-without-paying-interest-to-the-big-banks bogus garbage. If this prescription were followed and worked, then the USSR and China would have been glorious workers paradises for sure and we'd all be happy little communists.

The USSR and China both had Bolsheviks running the show who believed in Central Banks creating money through debt until recently. Who do you think overthrew the Romanov's? It takes a lot of money to start and forment a revolution, where do you think this money came from? Lenin had $25 million in gold, a sizeable fund to work with during the time period, did Lenin's writings earn him this kind of cash? New York, London and Frankfurt banks funded the Bolsheviks, for what purpose? After the revolution Lenin choses White Russia's banking system. I think the banks would have won no matter which side won. This all had nothing to do with creating a workers paradise and everything to do with taking over Russia's Central Bank from the Czar's. Today it looks like the Russian's are trying to take their Central Bank back. In the next few years we'll see if they had any success in doing so.

[grapejelly]

Re: Money as Debt

My point is that government printing money in a controlled fashion consistent with the growth of the underlying economy, and communism, are both pipe dreams.

Central banks are under government control anyhow. They are subject to the political will of those in power. There is no reason for the governments to eliminate central banks because the central banks are instruments of the political will of those who are in power.

[ThinkBig]

Re: Money as Debt

Thought provoking.

Hope this stays up for a while. I'm trying to get others to look at it.

[Spartacus]

Re: Money as Debt

Hmmm ... I've not read a lot about Lenin's funding - are you suggesting that Karensky's provisional government was anti-Central Banking and the British/US/German/French (the 4 biggest at the time - maybe the Dutch too?) financial system wanted him gone?

The USSR and China both had Bolsheviks running the show who believed in Central Banks creating money through debt until recently. Who do you think overthrew the Romanov's? It takes a lot of money to start and forment a revolution, where do you think this money came from? Lenin had $25 million in gold, a sizeable fund to work with during the time period, did Lenin's writings earn him this kind of cash? New York, London and Frankfurt banks funded the Bolsheviks, for what purpose? After the revolution Lenin choses White Russia's banking system. I think the banks would have won no matter which side won. This all had nothing to do with creating a workers paradise and everything to do with taking over Russia's Central Bank from the Czar's. Today it looks like the Russian's are trying to take their Central Bank back. In the next few years we'll see if they had any success in doing so.

[worksg]

Re: Money as Debt

This is an excellent description of our predicament, but it does not deal with the much more difficult question of how to get from here to there. Must we wait for the exponential growth to hit a limit and the system to collapse, or is there some way to transition to a sustainable system?

[bart]

Re: Money as Debt

Paul Grignon's 47-minute animated presentation of "Money as Debt" tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it ... all » is being created. It is an entertaining way to get the message out. The Cowichan Citizens Coalition and its "Duncan Initiative" received high praise from those who previewed it. I recommend it as a painless but hard-hitting educational tool and encourage the widest distribution and use by all groups concerned with the present unsustainable monetary system in Canada and the United States.

Good video as far as it goes... but does anyone else notice the two major problems with the data presented?


1. The solution if inflation occurs with "no interest government created money" is more taxes. In other words, the government and bureaucrats win if inflation occurs, which builds in an automatic inflation bias - just exactly like we have now.

2. The statement that all money will go away if all debts are paid off is a logical fallacy. Of course money will be "destroyed" but the issuance of credit is not the only way money is created. The printing of money via a printing press is one, and a central bank directly creating it (like they do now) is another.


Does anyone know who funded the production of the video?
Perhaps I'm too cynical but "Citizen's Coalition" sounds like a front for some group with an unknown vested interest. It's the unknown nature of that likely vested interest that's of concern to me.

[Sapiens]

Re: Money as Debt

2. The statement that all money will go away if all debts are paid off is a logical fallacy. Of course money will be "destroyed" but the issuance of credit is not the only way money is created. The printing of money via a printing press is one, and a central bank directly creating it (like they do now) is another.

Please help me out, how is it a logical fallacy if the basis of our money is only created by a debt instrument? For example a gov. bond or a promissory note?

[bart]

Re: Money as Debt

Please help me out, how is it a logical fallacy if the basis of our money is only created by a debt instrument? For example a gov. bond or a promissory note?

A debt instrument is not the only way to create money. There are many others, a printing press being one.

Yes, the current world economy is based more on credit and debt than anything else but that doesn't mean that all or most money will disappear if all or most debt goes away. There's a leap of faith and assumption in that video that in my opinion is unjustified, the main fallacious assumption being that nothing else would happen while debt was being liquidated.

[Sapiens]

Re: Money as Debt

A debt instrument is not the only way to create money. There are many others, a printing press being one.

Yes, the current world economy is based more on credit and debt than anything else but that doesn't mean that all or most money will disappear if all or most debt goes away. There's a leap of faith and assumption in that video that in my opinion is unjustified, the main fallacious assumption being that nothing else would happen while debt was being liquidated.

Bart, Ok; given our current system once you "print" the currency how do you get it into circulation? Do you give it away?

[bart]

Re: Money as Debt

Bart, Ok; given our current system once you "print" the currency how do you get it into circulation? Do you give it away?

I don't understand what you're driving at.

In our current system, the Treasury prints on order of the Fed and then the Fed distributes it to the banks.

[Sapiens]

Re: Money as Debt

I don't understand what you're driving at.

In our current system, the Treasury prints on order of the Fed and then the Fed distributes it to the banks.

Mmm, yes, then how do the banks get the currency out to the people? Do they just give it away?

[bart]

Re: Money as Debt

Mmm, yes, then how do the banks get the currency out to the people? Do they just give it away?

If you want to believe that all or most money will go away if all or most debt goes away, that there are no other alternate possibilities and that everything in that video is true, be my guest - seriously.

I believe it's significantly flawed in at least the two points that I made above, although most of it also has good data.

[Sapiens]

Re: Money as Debt

If you want to believe that all or most money will go away if all or most debt goes away, that there are no other alternate possibilities and that everything in that video is true, be my guest - seriously.

I believe it's significantly flawed in at least the two points that I made above, although most of it also has good data.

You still didn't answer the question. Now, of course people would find alternatives to trade, Silver or Gold would come to be used. Bart, I understand money, the problems is with those that don't. Yet, my safety depends on keeping those that don't understand money docile and productive, if the greed of those that are in control gets totally out of hand, it is chaos for us all.