In 2017, Phil Murphy, a former Goldman Sachs executive, made the establishment of a public, state-owned bank a centerpiece issue during his run for New Jersey governor. He regularly championed public banking in speeches, town halls and campaign commercials. He won the race, and the nation’s second state-owned bank following the stellar model of the Bank of […]
People want the world to be a better place. We ask each other questions like, “If you were ruler of the universe, what would you do?” FOLLOW THE MONEY When I’m asked what I would do, I find myself going back to slogans I’ve used in Green Party campaigns. The first was “Follow the Money.” […]
Three U.S. presidents were instrumental in establishing Thanksgiving as a regular national event. On October 3, 1789, George Washington declared the first federal Thanksgiving holiday. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln made it an annual federal holiday. And in 1941, Franklin Roosevelt signed a bill setting the date at the fourth Thursday of every November. All three […]
“’You’ll own nothing and be happy’? David Webb has gone through the 50-year history of all the legal constructs that have been put in place to technically enable that to happen.” [Oct 2 interview titled “The Great Taking: Who Really Owns Your Assets?”] The derivatives bubble has been estimated to exceed one quadrillion dollars (a […]
When the FDIC put Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Signature Bank into receivership in March, a study reported on the Social Science Research Network found that nearly 200 midsized U.S. banks were similarly vulnerable to bank runs. First Republic Bank went into receivership in May, but the feared contagion of runs did not otherwise occur. […]
On CNN March 14, Roger Altman, a former deputy Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, said that American banks were on the verge of being nationalized: What the authorities did over the weekend was absolutely profound. They guaranteed the deposits, all of them, at Silicon Valley Bank. What that really means … is that they have […]
On Friday, March 10, Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) collapsed and was taken over by federal regulators. SVB was the 16th largest bank in the country and its bankruptcy was the second largest in U.S. history, following Washington Mutual in 2008. Despite its size, SVB was not a “systemically important financial institution” (SIFI) as defined in […]
Financial podcasts have been featuring ominous headlines lately along the lines of “Your Bank Can Legally Seize Your Money” and “Banks Can STEAL Your Money?! Here’s How!” The reference is to “bail-ins:” the provision under the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act allowing Systemically Important Financial Institutions (SIFIs, basically the biggest banks) to bail in or expropriate their […]
The Real Goal of Fed Policy: Breaking Inflation, the Middle Class or the Bubble Economy? “There is no sense that inflation is coming down,” said Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at a November 2 press conference, — this despite eight months of aggressive interest rate hikes and “quantitative tightening.” On November 30, the stock market rallied when he […]
There are work-arounds the U.S. can use to fund affordable housing, drought responses, and other urgently-needed infrastructure that was left out of the two recent spending bills. Congress has passed two major infrastructure bills in the last year, but imminent needs remain. The 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law chiefly focused on conventional highway programs, and the Inflation Reduction Act […]
