More financial control insane

It is said that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. It appears American government officials are insane.
 
They truly believe continuing and increasing the amount of control government authorities have over the American economic system will somehow create economic stability and help all Americans become successful in their economic lives.
 
History and current events, though, prove otherwise. America never experienced a widespread economic depression until the Federal Reserve System existed. It was in fact the interference and the control of the supply of money by the Federal Reserve System that caused the Great Depression of the 1930s.
 
Now Henry Paulson, Secretary of the Treasury, along with the rest of the Republican administration, wants to give the Federal Reserve System even more power to dictate to banks, insurance companies and other financial institutions on how to run their businesses, creating even more instability in the already topsy-turvy economic environment in which individuals must exist.
 
Paulson stated in his remarks on Monday, "Government has the responsibility to make sure our financial system is regulated effectively." Nowhere in the United States Constitution does it state that government has that responsibility.
 
The closest one gets is the responsibility of government to coin money and regulate the value thereof. However, that means government is to just coin the money and initially set the relationship between a dollar and an ounce of gold and silver, the commodities that are money.
 
The Federal Reserve System is not even the government. It is a private bank created by Congress to essentially print money when money is needed. The Federal Reserve System has done more harm and created more economic instability than any institution created. To give it more regulatory power is insane. It is like bleeding people to get rid of their disease.
 
Because the Treasury secretary and other government officials are asking for more control of the economy, they necessarily must have more information about what individuals do in their economic lives, such as when and where individuals make deposits and withdrawals and with whom they do business.
 
The regulatory blueprint outlined by the Republican administration through Treasury Secretary Paulson necessitates more information gathering and more imposition on the lives of individuals, making it tougher for banks and other financial institutions to do business and complicating the lives of all individuals. In other words, the end result is less freedom and individual liberty.
 
Americans, though, cannot look to Democrats for less regulation as they accuse the Republicans of not doing enough.
 
According to Paulson, state-based regulation is now outmoded. True enough. State government is not to be involved in regulating the economic activity of free individuals as well. However, that is not what is being advocated.
 
Republicans and Democrats alike now propose to have the federal government take over control of the American economy for which the state was responsible, which is also truly insane. There is no room for government control in a truly free market economy.
 
The Treasury secretary also stated another truth that in the private sector if institutions do not change they become obsolete. However, private institutions have an extremely difficult time of changing to avoid becoming obsolete when government officials control their very activities.
 
In a free market, one totally unregulated by government officials, the type of system that America was based upon, the control factor resides with the individual through his spending and not spending of his own hard-earned wealth.
 
If one wants to see more price stability, economic growth and allow the poorest in America to have an opportunity to have economic success in life, there needs to be less, if any, government regulation, not more.
 
The best way to do that is to start by eliminating the Federal Reserve System and then move on to all of the other existing government economic regulatory bodies. That will be a tall order. Government officials are not interested in giving up their positions of power and going to work and competing with the rest of American society to produce goods and services that individuals really desire.



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Howard J. Blitz is a local libertarian and
president of The Freedom Library Inc.,
2435 S. 8th Ave. His e-mail address is
info@freedomlibrary.org