Greece is the way we are feeling!
By Max Musson: According to those who promote European union as an idealistic aim and those who promote the EU as the embodiment of that ideal, such a union is intended to be beneficial for all concerned – a state of affairs in which each member state is stronger and more secure because of the fraternal support provided by the others. However this does not seem to be working out too well for Greece in…
The Origins of the Banking System
By Kasredin: In order to understand how banks work, it helps if we go back in time and explain how banks first came into existence. The topic of inflation is linked to the development of banks. As a teenager I studied the Elizabethan era in history lessons at school, and I remember reading that prices rose sharply during this period of English history. I wondered why this happened, but my history textbook did not explain.…
Financial Crisis: The Printing Presses Set to Roll Again
As the worldwide credit crisis continues, the annual symposium of international central bankers, held annually in late August at Jackson Hole in the Rockies, seems set to signal another round of quantitative easing, i.e. the printing of banknotes that are then used to repay part of the national debt of the individual nations concerned, and thereby stave off financial collapse. Public faith in central banks as guarantors of macro-economic stability has been massively shaken by…