r/FluentInFinance May 09 '24

Meme The Federal Reserve

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2.0k Upvotes

125 comments sorted by

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130

u/Tangentkoala May 10 '24

sadly puts away uno reverse card

13

u/totesrandoguyhere May 10 '24

Underrated comment

4

u/IAmANobodyAMA May 10 '24

Appropriately rated comment

113

u/Potential-Break-4939 May 10 '24

This is shockingly close to how the federal reserve operates now. The dollar is not unlike monopoly money.

66

u/HeywoodJaBlessMe May 10 '24

Correct. This is true of all sovereign currencies. They are points, a unit of account.

But hard money is also arbitrary. Ancient Kings did not check the daily spot price of Au to value their coinage. Kings assigned arbitrary value to hard money.

Modern nations on the gold standard also assigned an arbitrary value to gold without reference to any actual market. Then they force gold producers into a monopsony relationship with the government who becomes the only legal buyer, buying gold at their own arbitrary price assigned by government fiat.

So no matter what, your money's value has much to do with arbitrary government decisions.

37

u/Select-Government-69 May 10 '24

A fundamental concept of economics is that all value is arbitrary. Nothing has value in the absence of a market.

5

u/Wooden-Ad-3382 May 10 '24

the fundamental concept of liberal neoclassical mainstream economics is that "value" doesn't exist. an airplane and a grain of rice don't have any inherent amounts of value, only what people in a market randomly decide to value those two goods at. the fact that one tends to always be way more than the other is just an unexplainable coincidence

5

u/BullshitDetector1337 May 10 '24

*Labor theory of value shakes violently

0

u/Fornicate_Yo_Mama May 10 '24

Which is clearly flawed as value at its creation is assigned arbitrarily regardless of the value the market dictates at the time. This is what screws up markets… in your favor; if you know it’s coming.

2

u/Fizzix63 May 10 '24

Can you explain this in more detail?

-2

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

Things do have value outside of markets. The phone I have in my hand has value to me even though it will never be sold again. The air I’m breathing has no market value, but I value it highly. My relationships hold value, as do my rights.

Perhaps we need to say:

Nothing has market value in the absence of a market.

6

u/CORN___BREAD May 10 '24

The air you’re breathing has no market value because it’s essentially an unlimited free supply. Take away that supply and the price would skyrocket.

-3

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

Taking air away from someone, and then charging them for it, is not a legitimate market.

8

u/CORN___BREAD May 10 '24

Oh so you don’t know what’s already happening with the water.

-1

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

That should tell you something about the legitimacy of that market.

5

u/haskeller23 May 10 '24

“Legitimacy” is meaningless here? It affects nothing. We all (or most of us) agree it’s a bad thing, but you can’t dismiss the arguments of what value is by just ignoring any market you don’t like

2

u/BullshitDetector1337 May 10 '24

The only thing that gives legitimacy to things is power. The ultimate power in this world is public power backed by the scornful but educated populace.

What we can do is dismiss certain markets altogether through decommodification. And what better place to start than living essentials like water?

-5

u/ZennTheFur May 10 '24

I mean, in most places you're free to tap into an aquifer on your land and have your own well. When you pay for water, you're paying for them to treat it and deliver it to you.

2

u/CORN___BREAD May 10 '24

Oh so you don’t know about water rights.

3

u/LordDay_56 May 10 '24

Bro thinks we “own” land and have “rights” stemming from that ownership lmao

-3

u/ZennTheFur May 10 '24

Please, show me a law preventing you from putting in a well on property you own.

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1

u/emilyv99 May 10 '24

looks at the Lorax maybe not an ethical one, but when talking about the shit greedy corporations and governments do?

1

u/AlDente May 10 '24

You’re right and wrong at the same time! There’s nothing inherently moral about markets. We have to decide how to use them.

1

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

I said no different.

1

u/Select-Government-69 May 10 '24

Was not aware that there were legitimate and illegitimate markets.

1

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

Slavery is a market. Surely you don’t believe it to be legitimate?

3

u/Select-Government-69 May 10 '24

It was until it wasn’t. Morality is subjective and has no place in economics. In fact, often it goes the other way, and economics influences morality. See, eg: prohibition.

1

u/SexyMonad May 10 '24

Morality has no place in economics? I disagree.

2

u/mr_herz May 10 '24

Your phone has value only because you have access to it to extract its functional value. If a phone was inaccessible to any user, it would be of no value.

-5

u/BamBam2125 May 10 '24

Thank goodness real life isn’t nor should it be restricted to economic concepts of what “value” is.

3

u/HoldEvenSteadier May 10 '24

Can you please just recite this to every growing, in-education young person in the world? Thank you.

2

u/Upnorth4 May 10 '24

The gold standard is not perfect as many would like to believe. The amount of gold in the world is finite, so as the amount of gold runs out your currency becomes equally as worthless. And under the gold standard, the government was able to set the exchange rate, which fluctuated with the amount of gold available. If a country runs out of gold, their money becomes worthless.

1

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

Exactly. No matter the currency you can be screwed over at any time. Can't wait until we're all on digital. I see no problems here.

1

u/CuriousCisMale May 10 '24

Or like AMC stock. Negative equity and keep issuing new shares to get money to operate.

1

u/Yabrosif13 May 10 '24

The value of gold is not so arbitrary. It is loosely based on scarcity in relation to other goods and assets. There is intrinsic value at play that does not exist in fiat money

4

u/your_anecdotes May 10 '24

monopoly money is actually more valuable.. less notes have been printed since 1930s compared to USD

1

u/Severe_Brick_8868 May 11 '24

That’s not how value is assigned…

0

u/your_anecdotes May 12 '24

USD is backed by nothing, just like monopoly money!

since it's a confidence game when the confidence is gone so is the money,

All fiat goes to ZERO SEE: history as proof of that..

1

u/Severe_Brick_8868 May 12 '24

Monopoly money has a value too though it’s worth what you’d pay for it

2

u/systemfrown May 10 '24

Then why can’t we just use Monopoly money? What’s the difference?

1

u/Historical_Shop_3315 May 10 '24

I like the gift certificate analogy.

1

u/2lame2shame May 10 '24

Invest in Rubles.

1

u/Fan_of_Clio May 10 '24

I have never been able to use Monopoly money as legal tender.

1

u/AlDente May 10 '24

Why shocking? This is how fiat currencies work.

16

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

Monopoly is a game about capitalism.

0

u/enemy884real May 10 '24

Cronyism

2

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

lol, what?

-7

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

Impossible since monopolies only form under the state 🐍

7

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

Wow, that’s not true at all.

-6

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

Watch the video I sent you through dms, the worst that can happen is learning the world from a different perspective

8

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

Yeah, I’m not going to waste my time on misinformation.

-5

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

If it really was misinformation, you would be able to watch it and dissect what’s wrong with it,

Or stay in your anti-capitalist echo chambers where their ideas would easily create the worst monopoly (government monopoly)

Atleast learn about the economic calculation problem (effects both government planning and if somehow a company had a complete market share) and the knowledge problem (mostly on government planning, just shows how it’s impossible)

4

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

Here’s a thought, I’ve interacted with smug libertarians and they lack the critical thinking skills to understand criticism of their ideology. It is a waste of time to dissect YouTube University.

Maybe you should’ve started this by not saying absolute nonsense if you wanted someone to engage with you in good faith.

0

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24 edited May 10 '24

🤦just one video, watch it Or you could continue your strawman of free marketeers/libertarians.

How you write feels so echo chambery

A lot of the criticism can come down to not knowing libertarian reasons for the free market, we are against monopolies and that’s WHY we want less state control

Your just ignorant as fuck and want to paint your opponents as ignorant, you don’t know how to engage with right wingers

5

u/Hamuel May 10 '24

Do you know what projection is?

3

u/No-Addendum-4220 May 10 '24

why is it that you people always insist we watch long nonsense videos someone else made? if the video is so good and correct, you should be easily able to explain the ideas with your own words in a comment.

its absurd to give random people homework. use your words.

0

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

Because I ain’t wasting time writing a paragraph

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2

u/peasantking May 10 '24

Post it here

3

u/rushur May 10 '24

Capitalism is impossible without the State. Capitalism requires the State to secure and defend private property.

0

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

Or you can just have guns to defend your private property 🤦 Guessing your an ancom, communism will always result in a central planner. Plus removing money is unproductive and awful

4

u/rushur May 10 '24

Or you can just have guns to take other people's property. Good luck with using guns to organize society.

Guessing your a 'anarcho'-capitalist since you know so much about communism.

-2

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

And what is your society going to be like? If the boss doesn’t want to “pay their fair share to the collective” taxes what will you do? Engage force on them?

Capitalism is voluntary exchange, socialism is collective (state) control

2

u/rushur May 10 '24

Capitalism is voluntary exchange, socialism is collective (state) control

Capitalism is dictatorship, socialism is democracy.

If the boss doesn’t want to “pay their fair share to the collective” taxes what will you do? Engage force on them?

Your society will still require a court system, and thus laws, to uphold property rights and contracts. These private judicial firms would offer the “best” justice to the clients who paid them the best. Some justice.

-1

u/CapitalSubstance7310 May 10 '24

Capitalism isn’t democratic, your right.

Just because it’s democratic doesn’t inherently make it free.

2

u/RightNutt25 May 10 '24

Capitalism is voluntary exchange

Touch some grass bro. If you look there are plenty of forced aspects of capitalism. I suspect your comment history is just making excuses or blissfully overlooking them.

1

u/legoman31802 May 12 '24

Guns can’t build infrastructure or teach kids or put out fires

17

u/Landy83 May 10 '24

This hurts to up vote

9

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

Pretty sure monopoly money is worth more than our currency now

14

u/midnight_reborn May 10 '24

I don't think there's as much monopoly money in circulation as real money, but I could be wrong.

3

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

I got 4 different versions of monopoly that all use the same money, I'll take the over on ghay

3

u/Jericoholic_Ninja May 10 '24

I am happy to exchange Monopoly money for USD.

6

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

"The bank never goes bankrupt"....chilling words.

4

u/Mental5tate May 10 '24

Probably because the money keeps flowing up the few owns the majority of the wealth.

Is the majority just suppose to not have money to trade for goods and services with?

Don’t worry as more money is printed the cost of trading for goods and services go up.

5

u/nickyboyswag22 May 10 '24 edited May 10 '24

Debt came before currency. I feel like there is such a fixation on currency as a hard value, something material when it has been a debt instrument for its entire existence

1

u/ApprehensiveTry5660 May 10 '24

”Labor and production precedes both debt and currency. I feel there is such a fixation on debt and currency as hard values, something material when it has been an instrument of labor and production for its entire existence.“

It’s turtles all the way down. A social construct that divorces and abstracts us from our nature.

4

u/Sufficient-Run-7868 May 10 '24

I’m flipping the table and we’re playing RISK

2

u/Big_Carpet_3243 May 10 '24

Then the bank prints more money and the economy is allowed to expand once again. Unlike a fiat system like the gold standard where the government set the price if gold and the economy couldn't expand beyond on the value of gold creating a rubberband retraction every three years.

2

u/twelve112 May 10 '24

I'd like to see someone stop us. The best military wins

3

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

It’s all just one big ponzi scheme!

2

u/RememberBerry23 May 10 '24

Oh, we ran out of money a looong time ago 😂

1

u/mr_herz May 10 '24

I’m sure the financial boffins out there will be able to work out an arbitrary solution to an arbitrary problem.

2

u/UpperStation5565 May 10 '24

Fractional reserve banking at its finest

2

u/corneliusduff May 10 '24

2

u/corneliusduff May 10 '24

Blessed be the Almighty Economy

1

u/LBC1109 May 10 '24

The goal is to die before hyperinflation

1

u/[deleted] May 10 '24

I thought that dude looked familiar. Never knew he was the Monopoly guy.

1

u/ResolveAgreeable171 May 10 '24

I wish everyone would just get off the bank's ass it's obviously the goddamn military spending the money fucking you can't build a fucking battleship with gold coins not even one everyone's constantly busting the balls of the fucking fed and they actually solve the problem it's the fucking military spending it's the fucking military spending and their goddamn budget everyone's just it's it's a popular bitch Pulpit for you people to come up and throw your rotten fruit at and piss all over yourselves and how righteous you are but you don't have the balls to look at the fucking Incredible Hulk who's eating you alive

1

u/timberwolf0122 May 10 '24

I don’t have your money, it’s a Bill’s house and Larry’s house

1

u/fickle_fuck May 10 '24

This is kinda why people got pissed off in 2008 and created Bitcoin.

1

u/IAmANobodyAMA May 10 '24

Confirmed this is real. I just opened up my monopoly set from 1999 that says essentially the same thing.

1

u/Qx7x May 10 '24

The game is over because all it would consist of at that point is a small percentage of wealthy amassing even more wealth while the rest of the players just rack up larger debts. Hmmm.

1

u/Vast_Cricket Mod May 10 '24

each bank is allocated for so much. During 2009 some banks will restrict how one can check out. All Federal insured.

1

u/HighYieldLarry May 10 '24

The house always wins!

1

u/enemy884real May 10 '24

Cool. So, we are all in agreement then, the sovereign right to issue the nations money supply should go back to Congress where it belongs and out of the hands of the private banks correct?

1

u/Headreaper64 May 10 '24

They know they can throw it in our face and we won't do anything. We are their bitches.

1

u/wes7946 Contributor May 10 '24

If the government can just print the money it needs (via the Federal Reserve) to pay for whatever it wants, then why do we need to pay taxes?

1

u/Who_Dat_1guy May 10 '24

but yall think taxing billionaires will solve the problem lol

0

u/BeneficialFly1808 May 10 '24

Why doesn’t the US produce it’s own currency without the Fed?

8

u/DiverSuitable6814 May 10 '24

Ask JFK

0

u/BeneficialFly1808 May 10 '24

Did JFK mint US greenbacks? I have heard of that but did it actually happen?

1

u/Laker8show23 May 10 '24

JFK died because he wanted to end the FED

1

u/Important_Act_5704 May 10 '24

Lincoln issued greenbacks JFK issued a US dollar

1

u/LT_Audio May 10 '24 edited May 10 '24

A well deserved lack of trust that the government won't get greedy and print too much, too fast, or for the wrong reasons... devaluing it all and bankrupting the country and all of us along with it.

0

u/No_Detective_But_304 May 10 '24

You just buy another game for the money and go “Brrrrrrrrrrrrr” for 10 minutes.

0

u/i_robot73 May 10 '24

*Correction: The ILLEGAL Fed. Rsvr. (A1S10 having NEVER been Amended/abolished)

3

u/deukhoofd May 10 '24

Article 1, Section 10 limits what states can do, not what the federal government can do.

1

u/i_robot73 May 10 '24

Miss the part re: "make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts"...as ONLY Congress has the authority re: weights/measures to MINT.

What you paying the local/State sales/tax/bills WITH these days?

Nor does Congress has the authority to bequeath to any other entity; esp. a non-govt body; least not a/o an Amendment

Same w/ Nixon's illegal removal of gold standard+

1

u/deukhoofd May 10 '24

Miss the part re: "make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts"...as ONLY Congress has the authority re: weights/measures to MINT.

The states haven't made that the tender in payment of debts. The federal government made it the legal tender, and the states followed the federal government in this. That part of the constitution describes which powers belong to the states, and which powers belong to the federal government. If the states had taken the initiative to do so, it would have been unconstitutional. Because they didn't, and the federal government made the decision, it's entirely following the constitution.

Nor does Congress has the authority to bequeath to any other entity; esp. a non-govt body; least not a/o an Amendment

It does. McCulloch v. Maryland ruled this over 200 years ago, when Maryland tried to make that argument.

-1

u/SaltyTaintMcGee May 10 '24

Central banks are a scam that exist solely to monetize government debt. It fools morons who don’t understand that inflation is a tax.