Can the government tell the Fed what to do? If Congress and the president are agreed about what to do, yes. If there is disagreement over monetary policy — and there usually is — then the Fed does pretty much what it wants.
The worst of Bernanke's statements came in 2006, near the zenith of the housing bubble. This was the era of the subprime mortgage, the interest-only mortgage, the no-documentation loan, and the heyday of mortgage-backed securities.
If we wish to culminate the fall of the Berlin wall and get rid of the real socialism that still remains in the monetary and credit sector, a priority would be the elimination of central banks, which would be rendered unnecessary as lenders of last resort if a 100 percent reserve reform were introduced.
A so-called lowering of "real" interest rates by means of money pumping is basically an act of a diversion of real wealth from wealth generators to various nonproductive activities. Hence, contrary to popular thinking, the Fed's attempt to lower the real interest rate in fact leads to a higher real interest rate.
Bernanke's remarks were long and ponderous, Fedspeak plus excerpts from a typical intermediate-macroeconomics textbook. One thing this newest piece of Fedspeak surely won't do is give us maximum employment and price stability.
Rothbard sees much of economic history as a product of government interventions in the market.
The right alternative is not yet another and more global experiment in paper-money inflation.
Advanced lecture on the origins of fiat money systems, explaining the transition from commodity money to commercial bank notes and deposits, and fr
Compares and contrasts the principles and performance of alternative international monetary systems, including the classical gold standard, the gol
