MD: I had this dialog with someone calling themselves IMissLiberty on substack. We love to dissect these comments. In this conversation she is IML. I am TM (which is the same as MD). Here’s our dissection.
IML: The value of things is based on what you are willing to pay for them.
TM: Correct… sort of. It’s determined by negotiation…and that takes two parties. Once created (by making a promise spanning time and space and certifying it) money serves as any other object in simple barter exchange [SBE]…until it is destroyed (on promise delivery). In the interim it’s just stuff…like gold or dollars or pork bellies…or bottled water.
IML: Money is for saving the value of work and cost you already paid to produce something you sell today, not today’s cost to mine more.
TM: Money once created serves as the most common object in any SBE.
IML: Further, an ounce of gold found in your great grandmother’s treasure box is worth the same as the one mined and refined today–even though the costs were completely different in dollars or in whatever currency the older ounce was made.
TM: An ounce of gold is not different than a cement block…or money (after creation and before destruction) . It’s simply an object of SBE. It doesn’t matter who created it, when they created, where they stored it, what they paid for it. It’s just stuff. It’s not money. It’s just a primtive substitute…and hasn’t served as money in my nearly 80 year life time.
IML: The mining cost sets a floor but it doesn’t control demand.
TM: Supply and demand for each object (as viewed by the traders for that particular trade) dictate the trade. It’s the “negotiation” stage of all trades…SBE or otherwise. The other two stages are “promise to deliver” and “delivery”…which in SBE in the “here and now” happen simultaneously.
IML: Supply and demand are both involved in the future price of something you earn today.
TM: The so-called “price” is the exchange rate for two objects in SBE. It is set by the traders in the “negotiation” phase of the trade. The future price is estimated by “self proclaimed artists…like appraisers”…and Black and Shoals…and manipulated by governments and banks…and other imagination figments like LIBOR. It’s always a figment of someone’s imagination. However, if we’re talking about money in a “real money process”, it is always in units of HUL’s (Hours of Unskilled Labor). This simplifies the trade by twice: Both parties now know the “real undisputed value” of one of the objects. (a) It is in perpetual free supply; (b) it is in perpetual perfect supply/demand balance; (c) it is free of external loads…like interest; (d) it has no time value…doesn’t gain of lose with time or over space; (e) it costs nothing to create or destroy; (f) and cannot be counterfeited. They are left to agreeing on the value of the other object in the SBE. Ask a HUL to take an hour to make a hole; measure the hole; you will “always” get the same size hole (other conditions being equal) in all time and space.
IML:One could buy gas and store it, but gas is too volatile to carry in one’s wallet and has a limited shelf life and thus lose value.
TM: True, but irrelevant when it comes to money. Gas is not and never will be money. It’s just stuff…an object of SBE.
IML: Gold and silver have a non-perishable advantage as a store of your past costs/work.
TM: So do cement blocks. They’re all just stuff. Cement blocks have outperformed gold and silver over the last five years. When traded for dollars, gold and silver have gone up and down…cement blocks have only gone up.
IML: If I babysat for an hour in 1966 and got paid in two quarters I could spend that 50 cents to buy two gallons of gas any time in the future, and maybe more as the cost of extracting gas gets more efficient–as long as the quarters were silver.
TM: Great choice of examples. I hired baby sitters in 1966. They were paid 6 quarters per hour (I think my wife paid them 2 quarters)…same as my summer job in 1962. If we had real money then I would have paid them one HUL per hour. It was SBE.
IML: If they weren’t silver (counterfeit, paper, digital) they would barely pay the gas tax.
TM: In 1964 I paid one quarter (containing silver) for one gallon of gas (SBE). In 1965 I traded one quarter (containing no silver) for one gallon of gas (SBE). It proved the quarter itself traded for the gas. What it was made of (i.e. its intrinsic value) played no role. It’s even more dramatic today. You pay 10+ quarters (containing zero silver…or 90% silver) for a gallon of gas. You’re foolish to trade the silver quarters because they trade for more value in a different context…e.g. in making photographic film. That’s how money works. And why commodity money doesn’t work. In the case of coin: (1)the cheaper you can make it; (2) the more durable you can make it; (3) the more precisely you can control its dimensions (ie. weight, diameter, thickness); (4) and the more difficult you can make counterfeiting…the better. But it’s still just stuff when it comes to SBE.
IML: “Compared to the dollar” a decaying rubber-band yardstick is no better at measuring carpet than a dollar price over time, except it will fail much sooner and be replaced with something more useful.
TM: And this is the same for any object of SBE. An 1848 ounce of gold was worth more than an 1850 ounce. Supply changed dramatically in those years. At the end of the 1800’s the value of gold and silver gyrated…until by law they claimed silver was not legal tender…only gold and so-called gold backed paper was legal tender (another government imagination figment). In 1973 the French were owed some huge amount of money…let’s say it was $1B. The USA claimed an ounce of gold could be purchased for $35. The French knew by experience it cost $70+ to trade (SBE) for an ounce of gold. The French said, keep your dollars USA. You agreed to settle the debt in gold and we’ll take the gold. Tilt went the so-called “lie” called the gold standard. Nixon didn’t cause the failure. He just could no longer lie about it as his predecessors had. If we were on a “real money process”, the units of the debt would have been HULs and guaranteed never to change their value over time and space. Such fictions as gold stability have existed over all time and space.
An interesting exercise when comparing and contrasting two competing choices. If one of the choices is current practice and the other one is a claimed improvement, reverse their positions. Assume the new choice is the current practice, and vice versa. Now which one is harder to sell? This technique removes the inertial advantage all current practice has. It illustrates dramatically how ridiculous most “conservative” practices are. Electric cars vs ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) cars is a good case to practice on.
IML: If 1913 had been gold instead of a central bank, the income tax would still only tax the top 1% as promised, and it would be enough for peace and prosperity, but not enough for war.
TM: This is the Achilles heel of all government controlled money. Governments collect taxes to pay interest to the money changers who institute them. Governments sustain themselves through counterfeiting of money they claim to control. Central Banks are figments of the money changers imagination forced upon governments. They need them for another figment of their imagination…that being “reserves”. In a “real money process” there are no reserves. No one has to put their savings in a bank for the bank to loan out ten times that savings at a 4% spread (i.e.40% which doubles in less than 2 years) . And thus there is no such thing as a “run on the bank”. All trades are completely separate and isolated.
This is an interesting definition of a capitalist…i.e. two years. They create a bank; capitalize it; accept deposits; loan out ten times the deposits at 4% spread; double their money in 2 years; take 1/2 off the table removing all their original risk; and wallah…look mom, I’m a capitalist. What’s not to love about capitalism.
IML: The miners and refiners produce more when the price offered is higher than the cost of production. They stop when they are not offered enough, and then the supply drops. If they are hungry, they will produce enough for food or for dollars for food–it’s a market price.
TM: You can say the same for farmers growing corn or raising pigs. They’re just stuff in SBE.
IML: There is always demand for metals. Try to imagine life without them.
TM: Try to imagine life without food…or without water where it doesn’t rain much. Both are just stuff in SBE. In the case of rain it is genuinely free. In the case of food…not so much. And in times of food and water shortages, metals play second fiddle.
IML: Imagine filling your cavity with bitcoin or paper.
TM: I have. See this to know about Bitcoin: https://moneydelusions.com/wp/?s=bitcoin. Bitcoin dramatically illustrates that DEFLATION is even worse than INFLATION. The only “proper” level of each is zero. No process can measure it. And only a “real money” process can guarantee it to be zero…it’s the nature of the process: INFLATION = DEFAULT – INTEREST = zero.
IML: There is no similar floor under fiat currencies. The dollar and bitcoin are ultimately worth their weight in gold ($0).
TM: When you know what money is (i.e. a promise to complete a trade over time and space); when you know where money comes from (i.e. created by traders like you an me buying stuff with time payments); when you know where money goes (i.e. returned and destroyed with each time payment…or mitigated by INTEREST collections of like amount when DEFAULTed). The operative relation is: INFLATION = DEFAULT – INTEREST = Zero.
I value gold these days at roughly $2,000 per ounce. If you take all the gold in the whole world and divide it by the number of people, you get about one ounce per person as I recall…i.e. roughly $2,000…i.e. roughly 200 HULs. First, that’s not near enough for anybody’s need in trade…not in the near term…certainly not over time and space. But more importantly, the HULs are the only object guaranteed to have exactly the same value in every SBE. Gold goes up and down. Dollars go up…until they call the loans…then they go down dramatically. And as usual with all fake money…up is down and down is up when you think about it.
MD: At MoneyDelusions, there’s a tool we use to test ideas. Ideas come up when someone thinks there’s a better way to do something. Thus, something is already being done. People resist change and they will put great energy into preserving the current process rather than trying a new process that promises improvements.
Well, what if the roles were reversed? What if the proposed process was in place and working? What if the existing process had to prevail as a “new” idea?
Let’s try it with this article. Let’s assume that the “real” money process was in effect. Would the subject of this essay, The Panic of 1837, even exist? Or if it did exist or arise, would it be as severe under the “real” money process described in the side bar? If the issues could arise, could the actual existing process deal with the issues better?
Let’s give it a try. The article we annotate here is from Wikipedia.
Whig cartoon showing the effects of unemployment on a family that has portraits of Democratic Presidents Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren on the wall.
The Panic of 1837 was a financial crisis in the United States that touched off a major depression, which lasted until the mid-1840s. Profits, prices, and wages went down, westward expansion was stalled, unemployment went up, and pessimism abounded.
MD: Notice the language “touched off”. We’re reading this article as if a “real” money process was in effect and efficiently operating. Could anything “touch off a major depression” with a “real ” money process in effect? Why would profits, prices, and wages go down? Why would westward expansion be stalled? Why would unemployment go up? Why would pessimism abound?
The panic had both domestic and foreign origins. Speculative lending practices in the West, a sharp decline in cotton prices, a collapsing land bubble, international specie flows, and restrictive lending policies in Britain were all factors.[1][2]
MD: Note, none of these claimed causes exist with a “real” money process. There are “no” lending “practices” when it comes to a “real” money process. When a trader sees clear to deliver on a promise that spans time and space, he “creates” money. He doesn’t “borrow” money. Someone doesn’t “lend” him money. There is no resistance to a responsible trader (one who delivers as promised) when he makes the promise. The problems “all” happen if he fails to deliver…and those problems have a very different characteristic if “borrowing” and “lending” are not involved. The key element here is “responsibility”.
MD: Here comes the recommended improvement…”a central bank” to regulate fiscal matters. Well, we already have a process that “regulates fiscal matters” (i.e. those related to money). (1) If the trader creating the money is not responsible, he incurs and INTEREST load. Or more correctly, a “responsible” trader never incurs an INTEREST load. If there’s a problem delivering on a promise, that problem doesn’t get smaller by imposing an INTEREST load. The argument against a central bank is obvious. A central bank can only make matters worse. In fact, it can be used…and is easily shown to be used… to cause a panic. Further (2), Andrew Jackson had experience with such solutions and rejected the charter for the Second Bank. They’re saying here that the panic would not have happened if this “new centeral bank” idea was allowed. Let’s watch them make the case.
This ailing economy of early 1837 led investors to panic – a bank run ensued – giving the crisis its name.
MD: They claim an “ailing economy”. What caused it to be ailing? Who are these “investors” who are led to panic. With a “real” money process, investors only play a role when irresponsible traders are concerned. Supposedly, such traders are higher risk and thus must pay INTEREST premiums to cover that risk. It works like “casualty insurance” where PREMIUMS = CLAIMS. With responsible traders, CLAIMS are zero…so PREMIUMS are zero.
A real money process imposes INTEREST load in direct response to DEFAULTs on trading promises. Responsible traders don’t DEFAULT, thus they bear no INTEREST load. All responsible traders a alike as far as the process is concerned. Irresponsible traders come with varying degrees of “propensity to DEFAULT”. This is also true with casualty insurance where those with greater risk of CLAIM pay greater PREMIUMS. And as with insurance claimants, filing a CLAIM is a choice. If you can resolve the issue without filing a CLAIM you can maintain a lower PREMIUM load.
And how about the “bank run”? Well, no bank exists. It only exists with the solution they propose. But its obvious here, it is their very solution that introduces this additional possible cause. And what is a bank run? It’s a case of “irresponsible banks DEFAULTING”. Their process has a 10x leverage advantage. They can “lend” 10x as much money as they have. Well, that gives them 10x the motivation to “screw” their customers…i.e. those who trusted them to keep their money safe. See how easy it is to show how defective the existing solution can be? The tables are turned. “They” must prove their case…and it obviously can’t even be argued, let alone proved.
MD: And here’s another claim that is easily refuted. Precious metals are “not” money. They are just stuff standing in as money. In a “real” money process, they play no role in trade. If you have surplus money and you think its safer to have gold, then buy (i.e. trade your money for) gold. That’s a choice.
Obviously the gold can be stolen as easily (or even more easily) than money. Remember, money may simply be an entry in a ledger. If that ledger is transparent for other traders to scrutinize (which the so-called financial audit does), then the money is difficult to steal.
This solution of “substituting specie for a promise” does nothing but give risk another avenue to come about. Worse, the value of the specie can change over time and space (e.g. a gold shipment can be robbed…or a new huge source can be found), and thus change in supply/demand determined value in trade. That can’t happen with money created in a “real” money process.
A significant economic collapse followed. Despite a brief recovery in 1838, the recession persisted for approximately seven years. Nearly half of all banks failed, businesses closed, prices declined, and there was mass unemployment.
MD: Look what happened! Half the ” banks” failed. With no banks to fail, there are no bank failures. You’re bank solution is openly flawed. Why? Because your solution presents a domino effect. One “borrower” DEFAULTs. If you’ve “loaned” out all your money, you can’t pay “demand” deposits. But with the “real” money process no such existing commitments are affected.
If a trader DEFAULTs on his promise, new “non-responsible” traders wishing to create money incur INTEREST load to immediately mitigate that DEFAULT. This is an automatic negative feedback mechanism. If the DEFAULT was the result of market softening (i.e. the demand prompting the promise was not as anticipated), then new traders are discouraged from making such promises too. Thus you don’t have “bubbles”. They get nipped in the bud. Further, if the demand is real, more traders move in to meet it and supply/demand imbalance is quickly corrected…thus prices remain competitive.
From 1837 to 1844 deflation in wages and prices was widespread.[4] The lack of deposit insurance deepened the Panic. By 1850 the economy was booming again, a result of increased specie flows from the California Gold Rush.
MD: INFLATION means there is a supply/demand imbalance. This is normal for any trade…except in a “real” money process, it is not normal for money. With money in perpetual free supply, INFLATION of money is perpetually zero. This is additionally achieved by mitigating DEFAULTs immediately with INTEREST collections of like amount.
And look how they say they came out of the panic! They found more gold! With a “real” money process, finding more gold just makes gold less dear…and thus trades of less other stuff…including “real” money created by traders.
So now I suggest you go through the rest of the article. (1) Make the case that the “cause” doesn’t even exist with a “real” money process involved. and (2) Make the case that the “banking” solution just exacerbates the problems…and in fact it is to the bankers benefit to instigate such disruptions. It is their way of manipulating the market. They call it the “business cycle”
The crisis followed a period of economic expansion from mid-1834 to mid-1836. The prices of land, cotton, and slaves rose sharply in those years. The boom’s origin had many sources, both domestic and international. Because of the peculiar factors of international trade, abundant amounts of silver were coming into the United States from Mexico and China.[citation needed] Land sales and tariffs on imports were also generating substantial federal revenues. Through lucrative cotton exports and the marketing of state-backed bonds in British money markets, the United States acquired significant capital investment from Britain. The bonds financed transportation projects in the United States. British loans, made available through Anglo-American banking houses like Baring Brothers, fueled much of America’s westward expansion, infrastructure improvements, industrial expansion, and economic development during the antebellum era.[5]
From 1834 to 1835, Europe experienced extreme prosperity, which resulted in confidence and an increased propensity for risky foreign investments. In 1836, directors of the Bank of England noticed that its monetary reserves had declined precipitously in recent years due to an increase in capital speculation and investment in American transportation. Conversely, improved transportation systems increased the supply of cotton, which lowered the market price. Cotton prices were security for loans, and America’s cotton kings defaulted. In 1836 and 1837 American wheat crops also suffered from Hessian fly and winter kill which caused the price of wheat in America to increase greatly, which caused American labor to starve.[6]
The hunger in America was not felt by England, whose wheat crops improved every year from 1831 to 1836, and European imports of American wheat had dropped to “almost nothing” by 1836.[7] The directors of the Bank of England, wanting to increase monetary reserves and to cushion American defaults, indicated that they would gradually raise interest rates from 3 to 5 percent. The conventional financial theory held that banks should raise interest rates and curb lending when they were faced with low monetary reserves. Raising interest rates, according to the laws of supply and demand, was supposed to attract specie since money generally flows where it will generate the greatest return if equal risk among possible investments is assumed. In the open economy of the 1830s, which was characterized by free trade and relatively weak trade barriers, the monetary policies of the hegemonic power (in this case Britain) were transmitted to the rest of the interconnected global economic system, including the United States. The result was that as the Bank of England raised interest rates, major banks in the United States were forced to do the same.[8]
When New York banks raised interest rates and scaled back on lending, the effects were damaging. Since the price of a bond bears an inverse relationship to the yield (or interest rate), the increase in prevailing interest rates would have forced down the price of American securities. Importantly, demand for cotton plummeted. The price of cotton fell by 25% in February and March 1837.[9] The American economy, especially in the southern states, was heavily dependent on stable cotton prices. Receipts from cotton sales provided funding for some schools, balanced the nation’s trade deficit, fortified the US dollar, and procured foreign exchange earnings in British pounds, then the world’s reserve currency. Since the United States was still a predominantly agricultural economy centered on the export of staple crops and an incipient manufacturing sector,[10] a collapse in cotton prices had massive reverberations.
In the United States, there were several contributing factors. In July 1832, President Andrew Jacksonvetoed the bill to recharter the Second Bank of the United States, the nation’s central bank and fiscal agent. As the bank wound up its operations in the next four years, state-chartered banks in the West and the South relaxed their lending standards by maintaining unsafe reserve ratios.[2] Two domestic policies exacerbated an already volatile situation. The Specie Circular of 1836 mandated that western lands could be purchased only with gold and silver coin. The circular was an executive order issued by Jackson and favored by Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri and other hard-money advocates. Its intent was to curb speculation in public lands, but the circular set off a real estate and commodity price crash since most buyers were unable to come up with sufficient hard money or “specie” (gold or silver coins) to pay for the land. Secondly, the Deposit and Distribution Act of 1836 placed federal revenues in various local banks, derisively termed “pet banks”, across the country. Many of the banks were located in the West. The effect of both policies was to transfer specie away from the nation’s main commercial centers on the East Coast. With lower monetary reserves in their vaults, major banks and financial institutions on the East Coast had to scale back their loans, which was a major cause of the panic, besides the real estate crash.[11]
Americans attributed the cause of the panic principally to domestic political conflicts. Democrats typically blamed the bankers, and Whigs blamed Jackson for refusing to renew the charter of the Bank of the United States and on the withdrawal of government funds from the bank.[12]Martin Van Buren, who became president in March 1837, was largely blamed for the panic even though his inauguration had preceded the panic by only five weeks. Van Buren’s refusal to use government intervention to address the crisis, such as emergency relief and increasing spending on public infrastructure projects to reduce unemployment, was accused by his opponents of contributing further to the hardship and the duration of the depression that followed the panic. Jacksonian Democrats, on the other hand, blamed the Bank of the United States for both funding rampant speculation and introducing inflationary paper money. Some modern economists view Van Buren’s deregulatory economic policy as successful in the long term, and argue that it played an important role in revitalizing banks after the panic.[13]
Effects and aftermath
The modern balaam and his ass, an 1837 caricature placing the blame for the Panic of 1837 and the perilous state of the banking system on outgoing President Andrew Jackson, shown riding a donkey, while President Martin Van Buren comments approvingly.
Virtually the whole nation felt the effects of the panic. Connecticut, New Jersey, and Delaware reported the greatest stress in their mercantile districts. In 1837, Vermont’s business and credit systems took a hard blow. Vermont had a period of alleviation in 1838 but was hit hard again in 1839–1840. New Hampshire did not feel the effects of the panic as much as its neighbors did. It had no permanent debt in 1838 and had little economic stress the following years. New Hampshire’s greatest hardship was the circulation of fractional coins in the state.[citation needed]
Conditions in the South were much worse than in the East, and the Cotton Belt was dealt the worst blow. In Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina the panic caused an increase in the interest of diversifying crops. New Orleans felt a general depression in business, and its money market stayed in bad condition throughout 1843. Several planters in Mississippi had spent much of their money in advance, which led to the complete bankruptcy of many planters. By 1839, many plantations were thrown out of cultivation. Florida and Georgia did not feel the effects as early as Louisiana, Alabama, or Mississippi. In 1837, Georgia had sufficient coin to carry on everyday purchases. Until 1839, Floridians were able to boast about the punctuality of their payments. Georgia and Florida began to feel the negative effects of the panic in the 1840s.[citation needed]
At first, the West did not feel as much pressure as the East or the South. Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois were agricultural states, and the good crops of 1837 were a relief to the farmers. In 1839, agricultural prices fell, and the pressure reached the agriculturalists.[14]
Within two months the losses from bank failures in New York alone aggregated nearly $100 million. Out of 850 banks in the United States, 343 closed entirely, 62 failed partially, and the system of state banks received a shock from which it never fully recovered.[15] The publishing industry was particularly hurt by the ensuing depression.[16]
Many individual states defaulted on their bonds, which angered British creditors.[17]: 50–52 The United States briefly withdrew from international money markets. Only in the late 1840s did Americans re-enter those markets.[citation needed] The defaults, along with other consequences of the recession, carried major implications for the relationship between the state and economic development. In some ways, the panic undermined confidence in public support for internal improvements.[17]: 55–57 Although state investment in internal improvements remained common in the South until the Civil War, northerners increasingly looked to private rather than public investment to finance growth.[citation needed] The panic unleashed a wave of riots and other forms of domestic unrest. The ultimate result was an increase in the state’s police powers, including more professional police forces.[18][17]: 137–138
Recovery
Hard times token, late 1830s; privately minted, used in place of the one-cent coin during currency shortage; inscription reads “I Take the Responsibility”, showing Andrew Jackson holding a drawn sword and a coin bag emerging from a strongbox.
Most economists agree that there was a brief recovery from 1838 to 1839, which ended when the Bank of England and Dutch creditors raised interest rates.[19] The economic historian Peter Temin has argued that when corrected for deflation, the economy grew after 1838.[20] According to the Austrian economist Murray Rothbard, between 1839 and 1843, real consumption increased by 21 percent and real gross national product increased by 16 percent, but real investment fell by 23 percent and the money supply shrank by 34 percent.[21]
In 1842, the American economy was able to rebound somewhat and overcome the five-year depression, but according to most accounts, the economy did not recover until 1844.[22] The recovery from the depression intensified after the California gold rush started in 1848, greatly increasing the money supply. By 1850, the US economy was booming again.
Intangible factors like confidence and psychology played powerful roles and helped to explain the magnitude and the depth of the panic. Central banks then had only limited abilities to control prices and employment, making bank runs common. When a few banks collapsed, alarm quickly spread throughout the community and were heightened by partisan newspapers. Anxious investors rushed to other banks and demanded to have their deposits withdrawn. When faced with such pressure, even healthy banks had to make further curtailments by calling in loans and demanding payment from their borrowers. That fed the hysteria even further, which led to a downward spiral or snowball effect. In other words, anxiety, fear, and a pervasive lack of confidence initiated devastating, self-sustaining feedback loops. Many economists today understand that phenomenon as an information asymmetry. Essentially, bank depositors reacted to imperfect information since they did not know if their deposits were safe and so fearing further risk, they withdrew their deposits, even if it caused more damage. The same concept of downward spiral was true for many southern planters, who speculated in land, cotton, and slaves. Many planters took out loans from banks under the assumption that cotton prices would continue to rise. When cotton prices dropped, however, planters could not pay back their loans, which jeopardized the solvency of many banks. These factors were particularly crucial given the lack of deposit insurance in banks. When bank customers are not assured that their deposits are safe, they are more likely to make rash decisions that can imperil the rest of the economy. Economists have concluded that the suspension of convertibility, deposit insurance, and sufficient capital requirements in banks can limit the possibility of bank runs.[23][24][25]
Lepler, Jessica M. (23 September 2013). The Many Panics of 1837: People, Politics, and the Creation of a Transatlantic Financial Crisis. ISBN978-0-521-11653-4.
Bodenhorn, Howard (2003). State Banking in Early America. Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-514776-6.
Campbell, Stephen (2017). “The Transatlantic Financial Crisis of 1837,” in William Beezley, ed., The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.013.399
Kilbourne, Jr., Richard H. (2006). Slave Agriculture and Financial Markets in Antebellum America: The Bank of the United States in Mississippi, 1831–1852. Pickering and Chatto. pp. 57–105. ISBN978-1-85196-890-9.
Lepler, Jessica M. The Many Panics of 1837: People, Politics, and the Creation of a Transatlantic Financial Crisis (Cambridge University Press; 2013) 337 pages; compares London, New York, and New Orleans between March and May 1837.
McGrane, Reginald C (1924). The Panic of 1837: Some financial problems of the Jacksonian era.
If The Fed Starts A Digital Currency, It Had Better Guarantee Privacy Tyler Durden’s Photo by Tyler Durden Tuesday, Apr 05, 2022 – 08:00 PM
MD: As always, Money Delusions will use the true definition of “real” money to annotate this article. The article appear in ZeroHedge.com as “If the Fed Starts A Digital Currency, It Had Better Guarantee Privacy”. And the title itself reveals confusion about what money is…and what its characteristics are. This begins by knowing what money is (i.e “an in-process promise to complete a trade over time and space”); how money is created (i.e. transparently in plain view by traders like you and me); how money is destroyed (i.e. also transparently by the trader delivering as promised); what happens if the trader “defaults” (i.e. “interest” of like amount is immediately collected); and how money trades in the interim (i.e. anonymously as any other object of simple-barter-exchange). Let’s get started:
Authored by By Andrew M. Bailey & William J. Luther via RealClearPolicy.com,
President Biden’s latest executive order calls for extensive research on digital assets and may usher in a U.S. central bank digital currency (CBDC), eventually allowing individuals to maintain accounts with the Federal Reserve. Other central banks are already on the job. The People’s Bank of China began piloting a digital renminbi in April 2021. India’s Reserve Bank intends to launch a digital rupee as early as this year.
MD: They immediately exhibit that they don’t know what money is. “Banks” have nothing to do with “real” money at all. It is the most obvious corruption of real money. And “digital” is just one of many forms of money.
Most commonly, money is just an entry in a ledger. In some cases it is in the form of coins and currency…both carefully designed to resist counterfeiting. In some cases it is in the form of a check (i.e. against a demand deposit). And we already have a fairly digital form of money in “debit cards”…a link to your ledger records that you carry in your purse. “Credit cards” are not an example of money. Rather, they are an example of “money creation”.
When you charge something on a credit card, “you” are creating money…a promise to complete a trade over time and space. When you use a “debit card” you are merely submitting proof that you hold some previously created money.
A CBDC may upgrade the physical cash the Federal Reserve already issues – but only if its designers appreciate the value of financial privacy.
Cash is a 7th century technology, with obvious drawbacks today. It pays no interest, is less secure than a bank deposit, and is difficult to insure against loss or theft. It is unwieldy for large transactions, and also requires those transacting to be at the same place at the same time — a big problem in an increasingly digital world.
MD: And before cash we had the tally stick…which claims to be the best implementation of money. And tally sticks were “real” money. They represented a promise to complete a trade over time and space. They worked better than gold. In fact, they could claim any kind of “backing” the trader’s agreed to (e.g. pork bellies). But nobody “traded” tally sticks. Thus, in that respect they weren’t money at all. They really were close to “crypto” in that respect…but much cheaper to create. You could create a tally stick with a twig and a knife. Today’s crypto requires insane amounts of electricity waste to create. They call it “proof of work”…which of course is nonsense.
Nonetheless, cash remains popular. Circulating U.S. currency exceeded $2.2 trillion in January 2022, more than doubling over the last decade. The inflation-adjusted value of circulating notes grew more than 5.5 percent per year over the period. And U.S. consumers used cash in 19 percent of transactions in 2020.
MD: Actually, the money changers are revealing the imminent collapse of cash. They hold lots of cash (counterfeited by government) and are doing everything they can to exchange it for real “property”. I get a dozen calls a day from “so-called investors” who want to “buy” my property. It’s a game of musical chairs. They don’t want to holding it when the “reset” comes as they know it will be instantly worthless. And also note, with “real” money, inflation is perpetually zero. No adjusted valuation is ever necessary.
Why is cash so popular, despite its drawbacks? Cash is easy to use. There are no bank or merchant terminal fees associated with cash. And, most importantly, it offers more financial privacy than the available alternatives.
MD: In actuality, cash is “not” easy to use. You almost never see it being used…even in restaurants and bars. I use it in bars just to keep score. I take a certain amount of cash, which when I’ve used it up I know I’m about to have had too much to drink. I spend lots of time explaining to other patrons why I can’t let them buy me a beer.
When you use cash, no one other than the recipient needs to know. Unlike a check or debit card transaction, there’s no bank recording how you spend your money. You can donate to a political or religious cause, buy controversial books or magazines, or secure medicine or medical treatment without much concern that governments, corporations, or snoopy neighbors will ever find out.
MD: With a “real” money implementation, there is no need for banks to be involved. All that is necessary is a “block chain” like implementation that resists the “three general problem” and counterfeiting. And when properly implemented, the “block chain” implementation is cost free. It has no use for “proof of work”. It “knows” it’s keeping track of performance on promises.
Privacy means you get to decide whether to disclose the intimate details of your life. Some will happily share. That is their choice. But others will prefer to keep those details private.
MD: But keep in mind, while “real” money used in trade is “always anonymous”, it’s creation is always “open and transparent”. Awareness of this distinction is crucial.
In a digital world, personal information can spread far and wide. And it can be used to exclude or exploit people on the margins. The choice about what information to share is important. For some, flourishing depends on carefully choosing how much others know about their politics, religion, relationships, or medical conditions.
Financial privacy matters just as much as privacy in other areas. What we do reveals much more about who we are than what we say. And what we do often requires spending money. In many cases, meaningful privacy requires financial privacy.
MD: Again, keep in mind that money is only concerned with the problem of “counterfeiting”. It cares not at all who is using it and for what. But people using it must know and expect it is genuine…i.e. not counterfeited. And of course we all know the principal counterfeiters of money are governments. For a “real” money process to exist, it’s operation must be transparent and impervious to any attempts to control or to counterfeit it. It is simply about record keeping.
Privacy also operationalizes the presumption of innocence and promotes due process. You are not obliged to testify against yourself. If law enforcement believes you have done something unlawful, they must convince a judge to issue a warrant before rifling through your things. Likewise, financial privacy prevents authorities from monitoring your transactions without authorization.
MD: Law doesn’t apply to a “real” money process. But open communication and mitigation is crucial. Again, it’s about making counterfeiting impossible. And when detected it must reveal who did the counterfeiting; see that the counterfeiting doesn’t happen again; and treat the counterfeiting for what it is… a “default”. And thus it immediately mitigates it with “interest” collection of like amount. This must be totally transparent…so the marketplace can ostracize the perps. Who pays the interest? Other irresponsible traders.
The recent executive order, to the administration’s credit, notes that a CBDC should “maintain privacy; and shield against arbitrary or unlawful surveillance, which can contribute to human rights abuses.” But a reasonable person might worry that the government is paying lip service to privacy concerns.
MD: A principle “axiom” must be observed at all times. If you are considering a government solution to any problem, you are still looking for a solution. Government is “never” the solution to any problem. It is just a magnifier of the problem.
A recent paper from the Fed, offered as “the first step in a public discussion” about CBDCs, suggests the central bank has no interest in guaranteeing privacy at the design stage. Instead, it maintains that a “CBDC would need to strike an appropriate balance […] between safeguarding the privacy rights of consumers and affording the transparency necessary to deter criminal activity.” The Fed then solicits comments on how a CBDC might “provide privacy to consumers without providing complete anonymity,” which it seems to equate with “facilitating illicit financial activity.” A U.S. CBDC, in other words, will likely offer much less privacy than cash.
MD: No central entity (especially a central bank) is ever involved in a “real” money process. Rather, it is the “process” that is the entity. As such, the process is universally used and totally transparent to all traders at all times.
We do not deny that financial privacy benefits criminals and tax cheats. Such claims tend to be exaggerated, though. In reality, it is a small price to pay for civil liberty. That due process applies to everyone — criminals included — is no reason to scrap the Fourth or Fifth Amendments.
MD: Taxes implies government…so it is a non-starter. If government participation was ever a valid option, it would be the “only” viable option. You would pay taxes (and only taxes) for everything. Your gasoline, your groceries, your clothing…all would be free. You would just pay tax and it would be covered out of that. Some people call this communism. Some call it insurance. It’s all nonsense.
Policymakers may be tempted to compromise on financial privacy when implementing a CBDC. Instead, they should attempt to replicate the privacy afforded by cash. Like non-alcoholic beer, the Fed’s “digital form of paper money” would superficially resemble the real McCoy while lacking its defining feature.
MD: Policy is the the marker here. No process is every properly governed by policy. The closest we should ever come to adopting policy is the “golden rule”. Policy is different from process. Money is a “process”. It cares nothing about policies like full employment and setting inflation at 2% (while continuously failing by a factor of 2).