$how Me the Money

There are a lot of things you hear about money: The Love of Money is the root of all evil. Money doesn’t grow on trees. Money can’t buy happiness. Nowadays there is a huge divide between the 1% of the population who holds in their hands the vast majority of the world’s wealth, leaving the 99% trying to pick over the remainders. Money is what makes people worry the most and makes them the happiest and the unhappiest.

The true fact of all money matters remains a secret for the majority of people. In this article, I will unveil the hidden secrets of money. [Hint, the current debt-based-fiat-money system was born in secrecy following a meeting of some of the most influential people of the time gathered on Jekyll Island]. I will also explain what money is and where it is coming from. [Hint: ‘money’ is created out of thin air and is just a piece of paper with no intrinsic value.] And finally, I will take you on an epic journey through history, right from the start where I will tell you the story of the Scotsman who is responsible for all of your money worries. Fasten your seat belt, it is going to be a hell of a ride.

Hidden Secrets of Money

There is a difference between money and currency, most people would not know what is the key factor that distinguishes one from the other. The best person to explain the difference is Mike Maloney, who is the creator of the series Hidden Secrets of Money; he made it his mission in life to see through all the smoke and mirrors that surrounds money matters. As the title of his series suggests, the true facts of all money matters remain a secret for the majority of people.

“Our true wealth is our time and freedom. Money is just a tool for trading your time. It is a container to store your economic energy until you are ready to deploy it. The secrets of money are hidden in plain sights, they are out in the open like the way the monetary system works, but most people can’t really see or understand how it really works; the use of technical jargon makes it very opaque and inaccessible to the uninitiated. The secret remains a secret because of a lack of proficiency for the majority of people. Other secrets are meant to be just that, secrets! But the truth is finally coming out, such as the fact that the Federal Reserve is a private corporation and not part of the US Government.” Mike Maloney

G. Edward Griffin the author of The Creature of Jekyll Island explains in his book the origin of the Federal Reserve. He describes it as a creature.

“Most people think that the Federal Reserve is a Government Agency. It is not. It is a corporation. The Federal Reserve was created in 1913 and operates like a banking cartel. It is a cartel of the biggest private banks in America. They are joined together for the purpose of what all cartels do and that is to control their own industry, prevent competition and make sure their profits margins are nice and secure.”

G. Edward Griffin

What is money?

But what is money? Money and currency are two different things. Currency is a medium of exchange, a unit of account that it (i) portable, (ii) durable, (iii) divisible and (iv) fungible mutually interchangeable – a dollar in your pocket buys the same amount as a dollar in my pocket. Money is all of the above plus (v) a store of value over a long period of time. The currency in your pocket is a medium of exchange. It is a unit of account because there are numbers on it. It is somewhat durable. It is portable. It is divisible and it is fungible, but it is not a real store of value because governments can print more and more of it, devaluing and diluting the currency supply, continually transferring wealth out of your pocket into the banking system.

Paper currencies have no intrinsic value and are used solely as a means of payment. When you board a plane to go on vacation overseas one of the things you are likely to bring with you is some foreign currency because as soon as you cross the border, the currency of your home country stops being useful. The same principle applies when you return home with left-over foreign currency; unless you change that currency, it will remain in your wallet with no value in the country you live in. Ultimately, currencies are just pieces of paper, with no intrinsic value.The dollar has lost 98% of its value since its creation by the Federal Reserve in 1913. All money created is debt and there are interest payments on it. There is always more debt in the system than there is currency in existence to pay the debt. The whole currency system is a debt-based system.

How money comes into existence?

‘Money’ is created out of thin air just by the fact that the Treasury and the Federal Reserve are swapping IOUs (“I Owe You”) with the bank as the middleman. This process is repeated over and over again enriching the banks (who systematically take a cut from each transaction) and increasing the national debt (the US National Debt stands at $23.3 trillion at the time of writing). The Treasury deposits the newly created currency into the various branches of government and gives it to politicians to fulfil their promises. The government then does some deficit spending on public works, social programs and war. Government employees, soldiers, contractors deposit their money in banks for safe keeping.

This is where the money creation process starts cranking up through a system known as Fractional Reserve Banking, which is a banking system in which only a fraction of bank deposits (i.e., 10%) are backed by actual cash on hand or money available for withdrawal. Banks are free to loan the greater part of their deposits (i.e., 90%) to customers seeking loans or debts. For example, if you deposit $100,000 in the bank and the bank has a reserve requirement of 10%, the bank must keep $10,000 of your money on reserve and can lend $90,000 to other customers. In essence, the bank has taken $100,000 and has turned it into $190,000 by giving you $100,000 credit on your deposits and by lending an additional $90,000 to someone else. This process continues to repeat itself over and over again with the next customer. This is where the vast majority of our currency supply comes from.

In essence, the commercial banks are creating money out of nothing then lending it to the people and charging interest on it. If individual persons decide to manufacture money in their own home, this is called counterfeiting. If an accountant creates money out of nothing in the company accounts, it is called accounting fraud or cooking the books, but if a bank does it, it is perfectly legal. It is absurd. But that it was it is.

The Founding Fathers of the Unites States knew the danger of central banking and a Debt Based Monetary System and this is why they wrote very clearly in the Constitution that only gold and silver can be money; but we have seen throughout history that what’s written on paper and what’s happening in real life is two different things. The American Revolutionary war itself started out as a tax revolt and to protect future generations from institutional theft and an out-of-control government the United States Constitution stated:

“No state shall make anything but gold and silver a tender in payment of debts”.

US Constitution

Only gold and silver can be money for the simple fact that you can’t print them into oblivion.

“The current system in the US is not only unconstitutional but it robs every American of the Liberty and Prosperity that the Founding Fathers fought and died for. By this means, Government may secretly and unobserved, confiscate the wealth of the people, and not one man in a million will detect the theft.”

John Maynard Keynes

This sentiment was reiterated by Sir Josiah Stamp, Former Director of the Bank of England when he said

“The modern banking system manufactures money out of nothing. The process is perhaps the most astounding piece of sleigh of hand that was ever invented. Banking was conceived in iniquity and born in sin. Bankers own the earth. Take it away from them but leave then the power to create money and control credit, and with a flick of a pen, they will create enough money to buy it back again… but if you want to continue as slaves to the bankers and pay the cost of your own slavery, let them continue to create money and to control credit”.

Sir Josiah Stamp

To understand more about money, look back at history

In 1944, near the end of the Second World War, world leaders and economists met in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire USA, to form a new world monetary system for the post war era, ‘The Bretton Woods System’. Within the Bretton Woods Agreement the US dollar became the reserve currency of the world, promising nations that they could redeem any dollars they had for gold. The dollar’s value at the time was fixed to a gold standard, other countries currency valuations were fixed to the dollar. This system favored the United States because the US could settle its foreign payments in paper dollars, allowing the US to simply print dollars to send overseas, whereas other nations had to settle their foreign payments in gold.

President Charles de Gaulle of France called this payment system America’s exorbitant privilege. The closing of the gold window by Nixon was triggered by the decision of De Gaulle to send a warship to New York harbor with instructions to bring back all of France’s gold from the New York Federal Reserve Bank. On 15 August 1971, President Nixon repriced the dollar/gold relationship to $35 per ounce and no longer allowed the Federal Reserve to redeem dollars with gold, making the gold standard meaningless. This date is a very significant date in the history of global finance as it marked the beginning of the era of fiat money.Fiat Money is currency that a government has declared to be legal tender, but it is not backed by a physical commodity. Fiat currency is created out of thin air and is based on faith and credit in the economy backed solely by public confidence.

If you want an Empire, first create paper money

The story as to how modern-day banking was created is fascinating in its Machiavellian brilliance. As Robert Darryl Schoon explains in his video series Dollar and Sense, banking started in England in 1694 and the key character in this Shakespearean tragedy was a Scotsman by the name of William Patterson. Patterson approached the King of England, King William III, with a proposition: “If you let me issue paper money from my new bank (The Bank of England) alongside the Gold and Silver coins that are used as money; I will pay off all your war debts and loan you as much money as you need so that you can go to war again”.

King William III as the reigning monarch of the time had absolute power over the land and over its subjects but was running short of money. Why? Because like most kings he was constantly waging war. So, when William Patterson approached the King with this deal at a time when the king was heavily indebted, he could not and did not refuse. Unknown to the king, his acceptance of that deal would change the world forever.The role that paper-money has played in the shaping of history cannot be underestimated.

At the end of the 19th century, Britain’s position as the world’s greatest imperialistic power was uncontested; the expression the sun never sets on the British Empire means literally that there was always some part of the Empire on which the sun was shining.Have you ever wondered how and why England, a relatively small island in the English Channel managed to propel herself to be one of the greatest Empires of all time? The key ingredient for this phenomenal success was paper money. England was the first country to develop a modern financial and banking system. Bankers loaned fiat-money to traders, ship owners, and government officials. The formation of the Bank of England was the determining factor that allowed the British to borrow ‘money’ to build a huge navy, overtaking countries such as Spain and Portugal who had exercised maritime dominance from the 15th century onwards.

The availability of finance allowed England’s navy capability and military resources to be built up enabling the English explorers and traders to explore, trade, and establish commercial trading posts all over the world. The British Navy owned the seas. These days fiat money is used to indebt and enslave the population. Bankers first made a deal with King William III, then they made a deal with the United States (which coincided with the creation of the Federal Reserve) and later with every government on the face of the earth (except for Cuba, North Korea, and Iran, the only countries in the world without a Central Bank.)

The whole world has become indebted because governments gave the power to the bankers to do just that. How are these debts paid off? Through income tax. The American Congress passed an act to legalize federal income tax imposing a flat rate to be imposed on each individual; this new law was enacted in 1913, the same year the Federal Reserve was created. Do you think this was a coincidence?

Quick stop-over in China

It is worth noting that the Chinese were the first to create paper money around the year 1000 AD. During that time money was in the form of gold and silver coins, but most cash coins were made from copper or bronze alloys. In the province of Sichuan, there was a shortage of copper, so, some inventive men came up with the idea of minting iron coins instead of copper. Iron was worth less than copper, but the idea was to mint more of it to make up the difference. The problem with this solution was that a large amount of iron coinage was required to purchase items that were both very heavy and hugely inconvenient to carry around.

To resolve this problem people started to leave their coins on deposit at money shops; money shops kept coins safe in their store and issued the owner with a receipt, which was then used to purchase food or other items. That receipt, or piece of paper, represented the exact amount of iron that a person had on deposit at the money shop. This system worked well; until the people at the money shop realized that their receipt was as good as money. The money shops started printing more of these receipts than they had coins in deposit and fairly soon, prices started going up, things got out of control and economic chaos followed putting the local government in a state of crisis.

In 1022, the Sichuan Provincial Government had to be rescued, or bailed-out, by the Central Chinese Government.Central Government officials came to Sichuan Province to assess the situation and report back; the officials shut everything down but realized that this paper money system was a very clever idea. Two years after the incident in Sichuan the Chinese Government themselves adopted a paper money system but declared that only the Central Government could issue these bank notes. The Chinese Government propaganda machine worked to convince people that the paper money was intrinsically as good as the copper deposited, but the truth of the matter was that the Government issued a significantly higher value of paper money than there was copper stored.

What is freedom? Freedom is about having choices. The more choices you have the more freedom you have and vice versa. In our society money is a conduit that facilitates choices. The 1% control the 99% of the population by keeping a firm grip on money creation and money distribution.

For the 1%, money is power. For the 99% knowledge is power. Know how the system works and you will become powerful.

For a more detailed analysis of this fascinating subject please refer to Chapters 8 & 9 of my book “This Is Your Quest’.

If you liked this post you can follow me on Instagram, Pinterest, or Facebook, or you may also like:

• The Reed Manga Series – Episode 3 – Part 1- Overcoming Obstacles To Finding Your Purpose
• The Reed Manga Series – Episode 2 Part 2 – Finding Your Purpose – Intellectual Sparring Match
• The Reed Manga Series – Episode 2 – Part 1 – Find Your Purpose
• The Reed Manga Series – Episode 1 – Part 2 – Understanding The Significance of Purpose
• The Reed Manga Series – Season 1 – Episode 1 – Part 1 – Understanding the Significance of Purpose
• The Quest for Purpose – A Never-Ending Journey of Exploration and Growth
• Understanding The Human Need For Control: Navigating Fear, Insecurity and Uncertainty
• Brew Up Some Support
• The Lost Art of Listening Without Prejudice
• Self-Doubt: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
• A Comic Play Between Wisdom and Folly
• Think Better So That You Can Feel Better
• Being Single on Valentine’s Day
• All you need is love, love is all you need. Or is it?
• All You Need Is Love. Is This True? Maybe Not…

If you wish to support my work you can purchase my book This is Your Quest online at BookLocker, from Amazon, or from Barnes & Noble. The Ebook version is available on Amazon (Kindle), Barnes & Noble (Nook), Apple (iBooks) & Kobo. Check out my Amazon Author Page here or my listing on Booksradar.com.  

You can also follow me on my  FaceBook Page and sign up for a Free Guide that I wrote for women to remind them that they should give themselves permission to be all that they can be.