Dollar Continues Advance Towards Worthlessness

Pretty soon the paper that lines your pocketbook will only be good enough to wipe your behind with.

From Philipp Bagus of Mises.com,

On Tuesday, March 26, 2012, I was invited by Ron Paul and his staff to assist a meeting of the Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology Subcommittee of the House Committee on Financial Services. The title of the hearing was “Federal Reserve Aid to the Eurozone: Its Impact on the U.S. and the Dollar.”

Unfortunately, Ben Bernanke had not come to the hearing, being busy with propaganda lectures in favor of the Fed. Instead, two of his colleagues, Mr. William C. Dudley (president and chief executive officer, Federal Reserve Bank of New York) and Dr. Steven B. Kamin (director, Division of International Finance, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System), showed up to answer the committee’s questions on currency swaps with other central banks.

The hearing was on the Fed’s currency swap with the ECB, which, according to Mr. Bagus, amounts to a covert bailout of European banks. It’s also covered on ZeroHedge.

Those of you who know me, know my non-interventionist views do not apply only to the military. Taxation is theft, and using those tax dollars to bail out foreign banks is the worst sin. Ok, maybe it’s not that bad. But you get the idea.

Chart US Dollar 2 — Only after the Federal Reserve took hold in 1913 did we see a steady decline of the purchasing power of the dollar. (Hewitt, Januray 7 2009) The dollar has lost 97 percent of its value since 1913 when the Federal Reserve was created. Out of control inflation has been with us for almost 100 years. (National Inflation Association, 2011). Looking at purchasing power of a dollar in 1800 and one in 1900 people will see that it was relatively stable over time. US dollars have lost approximately 84 percent of their purchasing power since 1970.

As you can see in the above chart, the dollar has lost a considerable amount of its purchasing power over time, especially since the creation of the Federal Reserve. Thanks to this, we have seen an increase in gas prices and indeed price increases in everything.

The Federal Reserve (which is neither federal nor reserve) has even stated their explicit goal is to devalue the dollar by 33%:

The Federal Reserve Open Market Committee (FOMC) has made it official: After its latest two day meeting, it announced its goal to devalue the dollar by 33% over the next 20 years. The debauch of the dollar will be even greater if the Fed exceeds its goal of a 2 percent per year increase in the price level. An increase in the price level of 2% in any one year is barely noticeable….But, an increase of 2% a year over a period of 20 years will lead to a 50% increase in the price level. It will take 150 (2032) dollars to purchase the same basket of goods 100 (2012) dollars can buy today. What will be called the “dollar” in 2032 will be worth one-third less (100/150) than what we call a dollar today. The Fed’s zero interest rate policy accentuates the negative consequences of this steady erosion in the dollar’s buying power by imposing a negative return on short-term bonds and bank deposits. In effect, the Fed has announced a course of action that will steal — there is no better word for it — nearly 10 percent of the value of American’s hard earned savings over the next 4 years. (Source – Thanks to The Humble Libertarian)

It’s time we end the fed, or else our money will become a worthy replacement for toilet paper.

Special thanks to Margaret Leber for bringing this to my attention.

Aaron Graves

Aaron Graves is a veteran and a staunch libertarian, consistently breaking ranks with his Conservative friends on social issues, and with his Liberal friends on economic issues. He is also the guy that wrote the crap that you just read. Sic Semper Tyrannis