Are banks the largest recipients of corporate welfare? You tell me. Until 1971 this country printed money on the gold standard, meaning that every dollar that was printed by our treasury was backed by an equal weight of gold and/or other precious metal held in Fort Knox and other depositories by our government on behalf of we, the people. Since the early 1970s, the U.S. has been on a fiat-based system, meaning belief, faith or trust, with our printed dollars based on the trust that the future taxes collected from income will guarantee the payment of those dollars and bonds printed.
So the money printed by the U.S. Treasury is ours; backed and guaranteed by our reserves and the taxes levied on incomes of the citizens and corporations of this great country. Right? So I ask you, why must our money pass through private/corporate hands to get us and we pay them a fee to receive it? Is it the distribution fee? If so, why do we not have national banks on street corners around this country and avoid the robbery of private institutions?
Could you imagine borrowing from ourselves through our government banks? Could you imagine home mortgages at 3 percent, or whatever the cost would be to employ people to process these loans? I”ve said 3 percent because that is the basic overhead cost of operating Medicare and apply it here as a probability. It seems to me though, that operating a national healthcare system may be far more complicated and costly than processing loans, savings and credit. It may cost less to operate a national banking system. How about some excessive interest, say 4, 5 or even 6 percent for an auto loan? Maybe more outrageous: 9, 10 or even 11 percent for credit cards. We could possibly pay off the national debt and have a surplus.
As an allegory, let”s say that our government employed people to manufacture automobiles. The government then takes these cars and gives them at, or just slightly over cost, to the big three U.S. auto companies that in turn, sell them to us at a tremendous mark-up. Maybe at a mark-up of 1,000 percent, 2,000 percent or more. Would you not want to purchase your car directly from the government and avoid the middle man? You tell me.
Timothy Everton
Clearlake
