REVIVING THE LOCAL ECONOMY WITH PUBLICLY OWNED BANKS

The credit crunch is getting worse on Main Street, despite a Wall Street bailout now in the trillions of dollars. The Federal Reserve’s charts show that “base money” is rapidly expanding—meaning coins, paper money, and commercial banks’ reserves with the central bank. But the money isn’t getting where it needs to go to stimulate economic growth: into the bank accounts of American businesses and consumers. The Fed has been pumping out money to the banks, and their reserves have been growing at unprecedented rates, but the money supply in the real economy has been declining.

Chartered banks are allowed to create credit on their books equal to many times their deposit base, but lately they haven’t been doing it. In more normal times, one dollar in base money has been fanned by the banks into $8.50 in loans. Today, one dollar in base money produces only one dollar in loans [emphasis mine]. Although the Fed has been frantically pushing cash into the banks, it can’t make them lend to consumers.

Some local politicians are looking into the feasibility of opening their own publicly-owned banks, providing them with their own credit machines. A new publicly owned bank would have a clean set of books, untainted by the Wall Street addiction to gambling in complex derivatives; and its profits would go back to the local government and community, rather than being siphoned off in exorbitant salaries, bonuses, and dividends. A publicly-owned bank could funnel credit where it is needed most, directly into the local economy.

Today, one dollar in base money produces only one dollar in loans. “The horror! The horror!”

Now if they really wanted to solve our banking system problems…