George Selgin
@GeorgeSelgin
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Money and banking fallacy demolition expert. I promise not to waste our time by saying things you expect me to say.
Granada, Spain
Joined July 2011
Att'n: @dandolfa @AmityShlaes @BrianCAlbrecht @PeterBoettke @Frances_Coppola @farmerrf @NickTimiraos @johanknorberg @jasonfurman @TheStalwart @MaMoMVPY @Claudia_Sahm Pass it on!.
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"If you want to broaden your knowledge of the Great Depression, the New Deal, and the economic situation during and immediately after World War II. you will want to read this book." Robert Whaples' generous review of _False Dawn_:
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When any economist today offers “monetary sovereignty” as a justification for state monopolization of money, I think back to early expressions of that notion, like this one on a coin struck in Islamic Spain, and wonder whether they realize how anachronistic their thinking is.
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For the truth about the wildcats, the U.S. "free banking" era, and genuine free banking, see
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Of course "wildcat banking" didn't work--not well, anyway! What is true is that there were far fewer genuine wildcats than many suppose, and their weaknesses were due not to a lack of regulations but to stupid regulations. But the fact remains that they were crappy banks! 1/2.
@JoeCarlasare It’s the logical obvious . It’s not that Wildcat Banking didn’t work. People didn’t understand it then and the technology wasn’t available to support it. Power brokers maintained control through lack of optionality. Bitcoin changed this and brought the tech to support it.
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Fascinating:
@mrauchs @giovacatallaxy @GeorgeSelgin @BitPaine In South Venezuela gold is money, but I am not sure anywhere else.
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The point is that even with IOR the real burden society bears doesn't depend on whether or not the Fed pays interest on bank reserves. It depends on how much the gov't borrows, for it will owe interest on that amount to someone no matter what.
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IOR boosts the demand for reserves, allowing the Fed to finance a larger Treasury portfolio without generating (even more!) unwanted inflation. Banks' demand for real (inflation-adjusted) reserve balances would be much lower otherwise.
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Steve agrees with Cruz. But both overlook the fact that bank reserves are (mostly) backed by Treasuries. Absent IOR, either banks and others would have to directly hold, and earn interest on, those same Treasuries, or the gov't would have to reduce its borrowing. 1/.
Did you know the Federal Reserve pays banks billions of your money for doing practically nothing? . Or that the economic theory they used to justify bailing out the system after 2008 is a complete myth?. Learn more in the first comment. #usa #economics
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Defining “ungulate” as “having hooves” can’t be right, ‘cause look how different cows are from horses!.
@GeorgeSelgin @BitPaine Defining money as a "medium of exchange" is like calling a plane a "means of transport." It's not incorrect, but it's not a definition—it describes function, not essence. A bike is also a means of transport, yet a bike and a plane are fundamentally different. Good luck traveling.
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I’ve been a critic of the Fed’s post-2008 IOR-based “floor” operating system as long as anyone. But IOR is no more a transfer to the banks than the interest they’d receive if they held Treasuries now held by the Fed directly instead of having the Fed serve as an intermediary.
Central bank remuneration of reserves : a technicality? 🤔.No. It's a transfer of hundreds of billions to the banking sector, and the key to an important economic debate. I just published an article on the subject⤵️.#MMT.
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RT @BBKogan: New from CBO: the Senate-passed “big beautiful bill” adds $3.4 trillion to the deficit. However according to @BudgetHawks, if….
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RT @RichardMorrison: By the way, you all should be reading everything @EconWithNick puts out. Check out his Substack, ."Banking, Bureaucrac….
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I made the mistake of declaring that Bitcoin hasn’t proven to be a cure for cancer, and sure enough… . (And I wonder why Bitcoiners get all bent out of shape when I suggest that it isn’t even poised to displace the U.S. dollar!).
@BitPaine Counterintuitively, Bitcoin will literally solve cancer by removing the Fiat incentives that ensure our healthcare system keeps us sick. To change the direction of society one must attack the incentives not the individual symptoms of a diseased economy. @GeorgeSelgin.
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As if we libertarians were all either (1) unaware that many of our beliefs are unpopular or (2) unprincipled creeps just wanting power. It’s sheer speculation, but I’m guessing that a wee-bit of projection informs assumption (2).
The libertarian delusion is that there is a large political constituency for their ideology. It does not exist. Libertarians have never performed nationally above a number rounding to zero. And when libertarians run for president within the GOP, they are the first ones out.
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Subtweets like this one have me thinking that there’s something to it!.
@BitPaine Brent Johnson and George Selgin believe the world is waiting for them with trumpets & balloons for the day they declare Bitcoin to be money.
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The claim that the New Deal ended the Depression is risible. By 1938 it was over as an active legislative program. Yet a year later over 17% of the U.S. labor force was either unemployed or on work relief that New Dealers themselves considered a poor substitute for “real’ jobs.
@RBReich Roosevelt pulled the country out of the great depression with his promise to Americans, the New Deal.
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Take the WSJ’s advice and include a little econ. history in your summer reading:
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I’ve long been a critic of the Fed. But I’m also a critic of bullshit.
Phillips Curve – End Inflation w/o raising Interest Rates. We have been feed a steady diet of economic lies and half truths t that increases the power and mythological status of the Federal Reserve, a unconstitutional, criminal, Marxist entity.
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