I understand their argument about how it could be legally and morally permissable to allow banks to offer FRB, but does anyone here understand their practical argument? Can someone explain why they think issuing fiduciary media can benefit society as a whole over a long-term time period?
It seems to me it is simply based upon preference, but as Hoppe, Block, and Hulsmann rebut, preference is not indicative of social benefit when the preference is a violation of property rights.
Check my blog, if you're a loser
Selgin: Bad economics, this. Demand for money isn't "infinite," demand is never infinite, because resources aren't infinite! To demand something, you have to be willing to fork over somne wealth or current income to get it! To demand money, you have to be willing to refrain from spending it on other things.
Bad economics, this. Demand for money isn't "infinite," demand is never infinite, because resources aren't infinite! To demand something, you have to be willing to fork over somne wealth or current income to get it! To demand money, you have to be willing to refrain from spending it on other things.
OK there's really been a lot of anger vs. that statement
All I mean, is that ceteris paribus everyone would rather have loads of savings to invest with than none. Just as everyone would rather thave loads of apples or loads of bicycles than none. But we can ignore this anyway, it doesn't change the meaning of my argument.
Savings are limited, and only savings can finance investment expenditure. Savings cannot be created by the production of money. Savings have to be saved. Giving signals that there are more savings that there are by inflation in the money supply does not create greater capacity to invest, just as it does not service the "extra demand" for savings to invest. The only way this increase in actual-backed-up-by-money demand can be fulfilled is through a general rise in the rate of interest, in order to entice more people into lending away their scarce savings. Pretending there are more savings than there are does not enable more investment, as it will eventually be realised that these savings are fictional, and the investment will have to be drastically scaled-down and abandoned. Investment that is undergone is likely to be unprofitable, as it will have been invested in an overly roundabout structure of production, and one not suited to the format of consumer preferences. Consumer preferences reassert themself and liquidate the unsound investments of the boom period.
Basic Mises.
The difference between libertarianism and socialism is that libertarians will tolerate the existence of a socialist community, but socialists can't tolerate a libertarian community.
DD5: "You can't provide a theoretical explanation to how FRB can evolve in a free-market, then you don't have a theory at all. That is, in the scientific sense. You cannot simply observe an event in history and deduce from that anything scientifically meaningful. You must be able to explain what you observe. You could have observed a rare coincidental event that appears as though FRB evolved in a free banking system, or more likely, that the system was not as free as you portray it to be."
I've written in great detail concerning how a free banking system develops. See chapter 2 of The Theory of Free Banking or my and Larry White's 1987 Economic Inquiry article, on which that chapter was based, "The Evolution of a Free Banking System." As for the Scottish system being a rare case, I mentioned that it was only one of several instances of relatively free banking systems, all of which had single-digit reserve ratios. (Perhaps you've forgotten this part of my post.) For details concerning these other instances see the 1992 collection of studies, edited by Kevin Dowd, The Experience of Free Banking. In any event, epistemologically speaking, one "rare case" suffices to refute a sweeping generalization to the effect that, absent government supports, banks will hold reserves close to 100% of their liabilities.
As I've insisted so many times, there's a lot of literature on this subject, and we free bankers have, I think, done a pretty thorough job addressing all the relevant questions, in readily accessible journals and books. It isn't our fault that critics of fractional reserve banking don't appear to be conversant with this work, and so keep on repeating the same tired old arguments.
Larry White has reminded me, by the way, that the new edition of his book on Scottish banking is available online at http://www.iea.org.uk/record.jsp?ID=115&type=book Chapter three addresses Rothbard, Sechrest et al.
Selgin,
The history not withstanding why do you support a system which lends more money than there has been saved? It's inherently unstable as is lending money for longer than you have borrowed it for as the recent Block and Barnett paper shows.
The atoms tell the atoms so, for I never was or will but atoms forevermore be.
Yours sincerely,
Physiocrat
Because free banking generally doesn't lend "more money than has been saved." The opposite claim is based on ignorance of how fractional reserve banking works. I explain the way free banks work, and why they don't lend excessively, in very great detail in my book on free banking cited above.
And I repeat, yet again, that critics of free banking should read the literature on the subject, and not just works by critics,so as not to continue repeating long-refuted arguments.
Selgin: Because free banking generally doesn't lend "more money than has been saved." The opposite claim is based on ignorance of how fractional reserve banking works. I explain the way free banks work, and why they don't lend excessively, in very great detail in my book on free banking cited above. And I repeat, yet again, that critics of free banking should read the literature on the subject, and not just works by critics,so as not to continue repeating long-refuted arguments.
Ok. What would you recommend as the best theoretical defence of FRB?
Selgin:Because free banking generally doesn't lend "more money than has been saved."
I certainly agree! FRB are weeded out by the market process in any free market monetary system.
But this is through their inherent instability and through prosecution for fraud
Selgin: As I've insisted so many times, there's a lot of literature on this subject, and we free bankers have, I think, done a pretty thorough job addressing all the relevant questions, in readily accessible journals and books. It isn't our fault that critics of fractional reserve banking don't appear to be conversant with this work, and so keep on repeating the same tired old arguments.
I think we're all free bankers here.
I'm not sure what the issue is to be honest;We all agree that loan banking doesn't come into the questionWe all agree that contracts can be signed which don't guarantee one's money to be stored at all timesWe all agree that printing notes which promise something that is not there are fraudulentWe all agree that promising to hold someone's money and then not doing so is fraudulent
Do we not?
I don't think anyone here disputed that fact. On the contrary, that free banking doesn't lend "more money then has been saved" is the point!
The cirtisism was not against free banking per se, but against the idea that FRB could flourish in a true free banking system even if it were allowed. But I thought that was the debate, but now I am greatly confused about your position due to the above statement.
I think most will agree here that lending out no "more money than has been saved" is basically a 100% reserve system. Yet, from that statement it seems that you are now claiming that FRB is compatible with lending no "more money then has been saved", since you do claim that the Scottish system was free and FRB did evolve. I think I am greatly confused about your positioin now. Do you claim that FRB is not inflationary some way?
The claim that free banks don't lend more than is saved is perfectly consistent with their holding only fractional reserves. Suppose I save $100 (letting $ stand for a gold unit), and deposit it with a free bank that can get by on 2% reserves. Then the bank will lend $98, and no more, based on my savings. The lending leaves it with $2 in gold to back its $100 obligations to me. QED.
Of course, if you think (as some people do) that when a bank holds $2 in reserves to back $100 in liabilities, it must have made loans equal to 49-times the amount of savings brought to it, you will not see this! One of the first things money and banking teachers have to explain is the wrong-headedness of viewing banking this way instead of as described above.
Observe that a central babnk is in an entirely different situation, because it creates the banking system's reserve medium. So it really can "create money out of thin air." Competitive banks can't do that, fractional reserves or no.
The problem with this approach is that ignores the difference between loan and deposit banking.
Loan banks lend out all their money. Deposit banks hold money. They protect it for their depositors. They save them having to carry around gold all the time. That's their job. Their job is not to lend money. People are not lending their money to the bank. It's not a loan. The banks are storing the money, but the ownership remains in the hands of the holders of the tickets. They are storing their money. How many times does this have to be emphasised? Tickets to gold are traded on the basis that they represent real money in vaults.
Selgin:The claim that free banks don't lend more than is saved is perfectly consistent with their holding only fractional reserves. Suppose I save $100 (letting $ stand for a gold unit), and deposit it with a free bank that can get by on 2% reserves. Then the bank will lend $98, and no more, based on my savings. The lending leaves it with $2 in gold to back its $100 obligations to me. QED.
Echoing what Thedesolateone said, if an equivalent number of bank notes are issued to the depositor of 100 gold units and then 98 units are loaned out, is there not a total of 198 units now circulating? And is this not greater than the 100 deposited?
Selgin: The claim that free banks don't lend more than is saved is perfectly consistent with their holding only fractional reserves. Suppose I save $100 (letting $ stand for a gold unit), and deposit it with a free bank that can get by on 2% reserves. Then the bank will lend $98, and no more, based on my savings. The lending leaves it with $2 in gold to back its $100 obligations to me. QED. Of course, if you think (as some people do) that when a bank holds $2 in reserves to back $100 in liabilities, it must have made loans equal to 49-times the amount of savings brought to it, you will not see this! One of the first things money and banking teachers have to explain is the wrong-headedness of viewing banking this way instead of as described above. Observe that a central babnk is in an entirely different situation, because it creates the banking system's reserve medium. So it really can "create money out of thin air." Competitive banks can't do that, fractional reserves or no.
What about the the process of bank credit expansion that now will occur through out the banking system. That is the $98 will be deposited in another bank (or the same for that matter). That second bank will now keep 2% reserve ($1.96), and lend out $96.04. There is now $194.04 circulating from only $100 of real savings. The $96.04 will reach the third bank, and so on.. (I'm sure you are familiar with this process) This process will keep on indefinitely until the $100 has been multiplied by 49. thus, the money multiplier being 49. The amount of money that has been lent out as a result your $100 savings is now $4900. As long as all banks lend out by 1-minimum reserve, they can expand uniformly without the fear of competing banks calling on them to redeem on an amount that exceeds their reserves. Every bank after the credit expansion will end up with X49 in liabilities over its reserves. Assume for a moment that all banks receive a deposit $100 in real savings, then they will each end up with $100 in reserves of real savings, and $4900 of liabilities. Now, of course, and this goes into the heart of our debate, free banking would not allow this process to occur. In a free banking system, with free entry, no lender of last resort, no suspension of specie payments, and no government cartelizer, the most conservative banks or a %100 reserve bank would quickly expose all FRB banks to be insolvent.
What about the the process of bank credit expansion that now will occur through out the banking system. That is the $98 will be deposited in another bank (or the same for that matter). That second bank will now keep 2% reserve ($1.96), and lend out $96.04. There is now $194.04 circulating from only $100 of real savings. The $96.04 will reach the third bank, and so on.. (I'm sure you are familiar with this process) This process will keep on indefinitely until the $100 has been multiplied by 49. thus, the money multiplier being 49.
The amount of money that has been lent out as a result your $100 savings is now $4900.
As long as all banks lend out by 1-minimum reserve, they can expand uniformly without the fear of competing banks calling on them to redeem on an amount that exceeds their reserves.
Every bank after the credit expansion will end up with X49 in liabilities over its reserves. Assume for a moment that all banks receive a deposit $100 in real savings, then they will each end up with $100 in reserves of real savings, and $4900 of liabilities.
Now, of course, and this goes into the heart of our debate, free banking would not allow this process to occur. In a free banking system, with free entry, no lender of last resort, no suspension of specie payments, and no government cartelizer, the most conservative banks or a %100 reserve bank would quickly expose all FRB banks to be insolvent.
I don't refer to what you call "deposit banking" not because I'm unfamiliar with De Soto's term and usage of the term but because it has nothing to do with banking as actually practiced anywhere since the late middle ages. The insistence that, just because the word "deposit" can be taken to refer to a bailment, that it must do so as a matter of law (or ethics, or economics, or whatever), is perfecrtly silly. The English language is chock-full of words that have taken on new meanings over time, and that's what the word "deposit" has done in the contexxt of banking. Actual deposit contracts are debt contracts, not bailment contracts, and have been acknowledged as such for centuries, notwithstanding their having evolved in some cases (England, in particular) from bailments.
Murry Rothbard insisted on making 100% reserve banking a sort of "acid test" of true "Misesians," even though Mises's own statements about fractional reserve banking are as often supportive as critical of the institution. Rothbard has succeeded to a remarkable extent, and I'm certain that many of his converts would sooner kill their grandmothers than admit that he got it wrong. So be it. But there are reasonable people keen on understanding what makes Austrian economics good economics. It's for their sakes that I bother to argue about the subject. I frankly think the 100-percent reserve claims, and the bad theory and history used to support them, amount to an embarrassing blemish in the record of an otherwise great school of economic thought.
The "multiplier" only works as you describe it if the initial deposit consists of fresh reserves imported into the banking system. Otherwise the initial $100 has to come from elsewhere in the system, and the positive "multiplier" you refer to is cancelled by a corresponding negative one starting from the source of the original $100 transfer.
Thedesolateone: Oops Did I just edit your response to say what I wanted to say?!
Oops
Did I just edit your response to say what I wanted to say?!
I did that once to Wombatron. I still catch myself almost doing it sometimes.
If you find something evil that wobbles, push it. - Gary North
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