Bernanke Slams Audit the Fed

Reports Reuters:

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Wednesday rebutted Republican lawmakers pushing a bill that would give Congress the ability to review monetary policy decisions, saying it could compromise central bank independence.

Bernanke said it would be a “nightmare scenario” if politicians decided to second-guess monetary policy.

“That is very concerning because there’s a lot of evidence that an independent central bank that makes decisions based strictly on economic considerations and not based on political pressure will deliver lower inflation and better economic results in the longer term,” Bernanke told the U.S. House of Representatives’ Financial Services Committee.

The hearing was the likely last chance for retiring Texas Representative Ron Paul, known for proposing the Fed should be abolished, to grill the central bank chairman.

“Trillions and trillions of dollars (are) being printed out of thin air,” said Paul.

The Republican-controlled House is on track to take up Paul’s Fed audit legislation next week. The bill, which has been co-sponsored by more than half of all House members, looks set to clear that chamber…

Paul’s bill would direct the Government Accountability Office, an independent, nonpartisan congressional agency, to conduct a Fed review, and it would remove an exemption monetary policy has enjoyed.

Bernanke said the very notion of a monetary policy audit was misleading.

The funniest part of this story:

“The term ‘audit the Fed’ is deceptive. The public thinks that auditing means checking the books, looking at the financial statements, making sure that you’re not doing special deals, and that kind of thing. All of those things are (already) completely open,” (Bernanke) said.

Completely open? Yeah right!

Source: Paulitical Ticker with Jack Hunter

Notable Audit the Fed Details

Reason’s Brian Doherty outlines some important provision details in Ron Paul’s Audit the Fed bill which passed House committee last week:

This morning, the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee unanimously passed Ron Paul’s latest “Audit the Fed” bill, H.R. 459.

The bill would eliminate certain restrictions that now exist on any audits done on the Federal Reserve from 31 U.S.C. 714, such as:

    Audits of the Board and Federal reserve banks may not include—

    (1) transactions for or with a foreign central bank, government of a foreign country, or nonprivate international financing organization;

    (2) deliberations, decisions, or actions on monetary policy matters, including discount window operations, reserves of member banks, securities credit, interest on deposits, and open market operations;

    (3) transactions made under the direction of the Federal Open Market Committee; or

    (4) a part of a discussion or communication among or between members of the Board and officers and employees of the Federal Reserve System related to clauses (1)–(3) of this subsection.

Again, the above are the existing restrictions that H.R. 459, if it eventually passes the full House and then becomes law in unaltered or unamended form, will eliminate from Fed audits.

Source: Paulitical Ticker with Jack Hunter

Rand Thinks Ron’s Audit the Fed Will Pass House

And is hopeful for a Senate vote. Reports Newsmax:

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul tells Newsmax.TV that “the Federal Reserve needs oversight” and expects a full vote in the U.S. House of Representatives on legislation that would grant congressional oversight of the independent central bank.

“We need to have checks and balances,” the first-term Republican told Newsmax. “They are an agency that, basically, has destroyed 96 percent of the value of our currency over the last 100 years or so.

“We need to do something to have congressional oversight over what they do.”

On Wednesday, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee voted unanimously to authorize an investigation of the Fed to make it more accountable to lawmakers.

The measure was sponsored by Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul, a longtime Fed critic — and Rand’s father.

Sen. Paul introduced similar legislation in January 2011.

“I think it will pass the full House,” Rand Paul said of measure’s future prospects. He’s hoping for a vote this summer.

“There are many who don’t want to have a vote because they fear that a vote will pass. … We just have to get a vote.”

In the Senate, Paul said he’s “doing everything I can possibly do to get a vote. But over in the Senate, it’s just like pulling teeth just to get a vote on anything.

“I think there’s some chance I can get a vote in the Senate…”

Source: Paulitical Ticker with Jack Hunter

The Fiasco of Fiat Money

By Thorsten Polleit

I.

Today's worldwide paper-, or "fiat-," money regime is an economically and socially destructive scheme — with far-reaching and seriously harmful economic and societal consequences, effects that extend beyond what most people would imagine.

Fiat money is inflationary; it benefits a few at the expense of many others; it causes boom-and-bust cycles; it leads to overindebtedness; it corrupts society's morals; and it will ultimately end in a depression on a grand scale.

All these insights, however, which have been put forward by the scholars of the Austrian School of economics years ago, hardly play any role among the efforts of mainstream economists, central banks, politicians, or bureaucrats in identifying the root cause of the current financial and economic crisis and, against this backdrop, formulating proper remedies.

This should not come as a surprise, though. For the (intentional or unintentional) purpose of policy makers and their influential "experts" — who serve as opinion molders — is to keep the fiat-money regime going, whatever it takes.

II.

The fiat-money regime essentially rests on central banking — meaning that a government-sponsored central bank holds the money-production monopoly — and fractional-reserve banking, denoting banks issuing money created out of thin air, or ex nihilo.

In The Mystery of Banking, Murray N. Rothbard uncovers the fiat-money regime — with central banking and fractional-reserve banking — as a form of embezzlement, a scheme of thievery.

Rothbard's conclusion might need some explanation, given that mainstream economists consider the concept of fiat money as an economically and politically desirable, acceptable, and state-of-the-art institution.

An understanding of the nature and consequences of a fiat-money regime must start with… (Read more)

Source: Mises.org

Charting Fun with Krugman

By Robert P. Murphy

In a few recent blog posts, Paul Krugman used bar graphs and tables to (allegedly) prove the superiority of his views over those of the Austrians. Yet, as I'll show in this article, I can use Krugman's own data to demonstrate the exact opposite.

Krugman on the Fed and Banking Panics

Perhaps spurred by his Bloomberg debate with Ron Paul, Krugman posted the following regarding financial panics and the US central bank:

There's a very widespread belief on the right that banking crises only happen because either the Fed or Barney Frank cause them; go back to a gold standard, and there would be no need for financial regulation or anything like that.

This is, of course, nonsense; Walter Bagehot knew all about financial crises, which have been a constant feature of modern economies since at least the early 19th century. Just to drive the point home, I thought it might be worth posting Gary Gorton's chart of "panics" before the Fed went into operation:

Panics will happen; the question is how they are contained. (emphasis added)

Now although Krugman doesn't explicitly say "Ron Paul" or "Austrian economists," I think he has to have them in mind here. After all, before the Austrians rose in popularity, hardly anybody talked about the gold standard, let alone abolishing the central bank. It was the Austrians, and most notably Ron Paul, who put those ideas back into the limelight so that Paul Krugman feels the need to address the issue.

In that light, Krugman is simply making stuff up when he says such people think banking panics never happened before the Fed. Murray Rothbard's doctoral dissertation was The Panic of 1819, and Rothbard also wrote on the history of the Fed, so I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be shocked by Krugman's table.

But besides the cheap debating ploy — setting up his opponents as believing something obviously ridiculous — Krugman leaves open the door to his own demise in his final sentence, after the chart, when he writes, "Panics will happen; the question is how they are contained."

Fortunately, Krugman himself provides the answer in a… (Read more)

Source: Mises.org