The banking crisis and recession which started around 2007 and the astronomic amounts of public money used to bail out banks made it obvious that there was something seriously wrong with the banking system. This was very much a repeat of the 1929 crash and subsequent bank failures and recession. One response in the 1930s was the promotion of full reserve or "100% reserve" banking particularly by economists at the University of Chicago. However, full reserve banking while it benefits ordinary households and the economy as a whole does not benefit banks or the politicians funded by banks. That is, as Milton Friedman pointed out, full reserve (FR) tends to be opposed by vested interests. And in the 1930s, the vested interests won. However, the 2007 crisis caused a re-consideration of FR, and this book sets out the arguments for it. One merit of FR is its simplicity. It is certainly simple compared to other attempts at bank reform taking place at the time of writing, e.g. Dodd-Frank in the US or the Vickers proposals in the UK. Essentially FR consists of splitting the banking industry in two. One half is for those who want specific sums of money kept in a totally safe fashion. That money is not safe because of any sort of artificial taxpayer funded subsidy or guarantee, which is how bank accounts are currently made safe. The money is safe because it is INHERENTLY safe: that is, the money is just lodged at the central banks and/or it is invested in short term government debt. The second half offers loans to mortgagors, businesses and so on, but that half is funded just by shares, not by deposits which banks claim to be entirely safe (but which clearly are not entirely safe unless they are backed by artificial taxpayer funded guarantees). One of the many advantages of full reserve is that it is near impossible for the entities or banks making up those two halves to suddenly fail, and thus spark off credit crunches or recessions. Though given poor management, any of those entities can slowly decline, resulting perhaps in a take-over by more competent entities / banks. Also FR banking does not require any sort of subsidy, plus there needn't be any limit the amount of money that any individual can lodge in a totally safe fashion, that limit being £85,000 at the time of writing in the UK. FR results in, 1 less borrowing and lending, 2 a rise in interest rates, and 3 a decline in debts. However, that rise in interest rates would be small compared to the HUGE VARIATIONS in interest rates over the last thirty years or so. Moreover, in the UK, the size of the banking industry relative to GDP is currently about TEN TIMES the 1960s level, and it is unclear what benefits we derive from that bloated banking industry. Thus the slight contraction in the banking industry that would occur under FR would probably do no harm. This book is split into three sections. Section one sets out the basic nature of FR. Section two deals with the very large number of objections which have been made against FR. Most of these objections, even though they are put by so called professional economists, are very silly. No knowledge of economics is needed to rebut them: just common sense. In contrast, some objections are more plausible, though actually flawed. But that is not to say that the ADVOCATES of FR are perfect: section three of the book deals with some popular but flawed arguments put FOR full reserve. A final and interesting characteristic of FR is thus. Under the existing system, the large majority of money in circulation originates with commercial banks, not government or the central bank. In contrast, under FR all money is issued by the central bank. There has actually been a huge rise in the proportion of our money supply originating with central banks as a result of quantitative easing in recent years. That does not seem to have caused big problems.

Provides an in-depth overview of the Federal Reserve System, including information about monetary policy and the economy, the Federal Reserve in the international sphere, supervision and regulation, consumer and community affairs and services offered by Reserve Banks. Contains several appendixes, including a brief explanation of Federal Reserve regulations, a glossary of terms, and a list of additional publications.

At the height of the Great Depression a number of leading U.S. economists advanced a proposal for monetary reform that became known as the Chicago Plan. It envisaged the separation of the monetary and credit functions of the banking system, by requiring 100% reserve backing for deposits. Irving Fisher (1936) claimed the following advantages for this plan: (1) Much better control of a major source of business cycle fluctuations, sudden increases and contractions of bank credit and of the supply of bank-created money. (2) Complete elimination of bank runs. (3) Dramatic reduction of the (net) public debt. (4) Dramatic reduction of private debt, as money creation no longer requires simultaneous debt creation. We study these claims by embedding a comprehensive and carefully calibrated model of the banking system in a DSGE model of the U.S. economy. We find support for all four of Fisher's claims. Furthermore, output gains approach 10 percent, and steady state inflation can drop to zero without posing problems for the conduct of monetary policy.

Most central banks oblige depository institutions to hold minimum reserves against their liabilities, predominantly in the form of balances at the central bank. The role of these reserve requirements has evolved significantly over time. The overlay of changing purposes and practices has the result that it is not always fully clear what the current purpose of reserve requirements is, and this necessarily complicates thinking about how a reserve regime should be structured. This paper describes three main purposes for reserve requirements - prudential, monetary control and liquidity management - and suggests best practice for the structure of a reserves regime. Finally, the paper illustrates current practices using a 2010 IMF survey of 121 central banks.

In coming to terms with the still smoldering financial crisis, little attention has been paid to the flaws within our monetary system and how these flaws lie at the root of the crisis. This book provides an introduction and critical assessment of the current monetary system. It begins with an up to date account of the workings of today’s system of state-backed ‘bankmoney’, illustrating the various forms and issuers of money, and discussing money theory and fallacy past and present. It also looks at related economic challenges such as inflation and deflation, asset inflation and bubble building that lead to market instability and examines the ineffectual monetary policies and primary credit markets that are failing to reach some sort of self-limiting equilibrium. In order to fix our financial system, we first need to understand its limitations and the flaws in current monetary and regulatory policy and then correct them. The concluding part of this book is dedicated to the latter, advocating a move towards the sovereign monetary prerogatives of issuing the entire stock of official money and benefitting from the gain thereof (seigniorage). The author argues that these functions should be made the sole responsibility of independent and impartial central banks with full control over the stock of money (not the uses of money) on the basis of a legal mandate that would be more detailed than is the case today. This includes a thorough separation of monetary and fiscal powers, and of both from banking and wider financing functions. This book provides a welcome addition to the banking literature, guiding readers through the inner workings of our monetary and regulatory environments and proposing a new way forward that will better protect our economy from financial instability and crisis.

Discover how the global financial plague is poised to return, and what can be done to stop it This is not your father's financial system. Jimmy Stewart, the trustworthy, honest banker in the movie, It's a Wonderful Life, is dead. And so is his small-town bank, Bailey Savings & Loan. Instead, we're watching It's a Horrible Mess with Wall Street (aka the Vegas Strip) playing ever larger craps with our economy and our tax dollars. This book, written by one of the world's most respected economist, describes in lively, humorous, simple, but also deadly serious terms the big con underlying the big game?the web of interconnected financial, political, and regulatory malfeasance that culminated in financial meltdown and brought us to our economic knees. But it also proposes an amazingly simply solution?Limited Purpose Banking to make Wall Street safe for Main Street. This book, as well as the financial fix described within it, have received rave reviews from a veritable who's who of policymakers and economics, plus five economics Nobel Laureates Written by a leading economist whose insights on this topic are unparalleled Outlines the first and only proposal to fundamentally fix our financial disaster for good Jimmy Stewart Is Dead will fundamentally change the way you think about the economy, financial markets, and the government.

This work presents a comprehensive history and evaluation of the role of the 100 percent reserve plan in the banking legislation of the New Deal reform era from its inception in 1933 to its re-emergence in the current financial reform debate in the US.

The Federal Reserve (FR) created the Commercial Paper Funding Facility (CPFF) in the midst of severe disruptions in money markets following the bankruptcy of Lehman Bros. on Sept. 15, 2008. The CPFF finances the purchase of highly rated unsecured and asset-backed commercial paper from eligible issuers via primary dealers. The facility is a liquidity backstop to U.S. issuers of commercial paper, and its creation was part of a range of policy actions undertaken by the FR to provide liquidity to the financial system. This report documents aspects of the financial crisis relevant to the creation of the CPFF, reviews the operation of the CPFF, discusses use of the facility, and draws conclusions for lender-of-last-resort facilities. Charts and tables.