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So I guess where we differ here is on practical matters, not theoretical ones. Sure Congress created the Fed, but it's unlike any other independent federal age

So I guess where we differ here is on practical matters, not theoretical ones. Sure Congress created the Fed, but it's unlike any other independent federal agency. The president can fire the head of the FCC, FTC, SEC, EPA, etc. The president can't fire the head of the Fed. I understand why that is (to remove political influence) but at the same time, it makes those folks completely unaccountable. The only way to change things is to pass new laws, and for some reason it's damn near impossible to pass new banking laws. Probably because the banks have so much money and can lobby so effectively as a result.

snowwrestler 12y ago
The Fed chair is among the most independent officers of the U.S., but they are not completely unaccountable. As a civil officer of the U.S., the Fed chair could be impeached by Congress. But the standard for impeachment is high; I doubt a good-faith disagreement over monetary policy would do it. In general, it's hard to pass major laws. I'm not sure laws governing the Fed have any special difficulty. Gramm-Leach-Bliley in 1999 (which banks lobbied for) and Dodd-Frank in 2010 (which banks lobbied against) both had major impacts on the role of the Fed. There are plenty of issues with a 10+ year gap in major bills.
- msandford 12y ago
  > I doubt a good-faith disagreement over monetary policy would do it. Right, but the idea that the Fed is allowed to debase the currency at-will, with no repercussions because it's a "good faith disagreement over monetary policy" is precisely the problem. Just the language there attempts to steer the debate by hiding what is actually happening. The idea that banks are too big to fail and bailouts will always happen and whatnot has led to a tremendous buildup of risk in the system. Profits are privatized and losses are socialized. Heads I win, tails you lose is great if you're me, awful if you're you. In the absence of a "guaranteed" bailout (if you're too big to fail, anyhow) we might enforce some restraint on the banks but it might take a very painful recession where a bunch of them fail to do so. Or the government could break them up and say "nobody is too big to fail now, so good luck!" and institute some kind of rule about deposit insurance and banks' total assets under management. Ultimately I'm not so much a "gold bug" who loves gold irrationally as I am someone who wants some kind of restraint on the government. There are probably other ways to do it, but at least by using older methods you get the benefit of a lot of history to read and to draw conclusions from. I'm open to other avenues of providing restraint, but they need to be distributed and not subject to the vagaries of elections. The people have precious few ways to directly influence the government given the way that politics have evolved, so any way to return some power to the people is a good thing in my mind. To me it seems like commodity money is a way to do that without turning the whole world upside down, but it wouldn't surprise me if we differed on that point. Anyhow thanks for the conversation, it's been nice to engage with someone on the issue rather than just get downvoted.

snowwrestler 12y ago

The Fed chair is among the most independent officers of the U.S., but they are not completely unaccountable. As a civil officer of the U.S., the Fed chair could be impeached by Congress. But the standard for impeachment is high; I doubt a good-faith disagreement over monetary policy would do it. In general, it's hard to pass major laws. I'm not sure laws governing the Fed have any special difficulty. Gramm-Leach-Bliley in 1999 (which banks lobbied for) and Dodd-Frank in 2010 (which banks lobbied against) both had major impacts on the role of the Fed. There are plenty of issues with a 10+ year gap in major bills.

msandford 12y ago
> I doubt a good-faith disagreement over monetary policy would do it. Right, but the idea that the Fed is allowed to debase the currency at-will, with no repercussions because it's a "good faith disagreement over monetary policy" is precisely the problem. Just the language there attempts to steer the debate by hiding what is actually happening. The idea that banks are too big to fail and bailouts will always happen and whatnot has led to a tremendous buildup of risk in the system. Profits are privatized and losses are socialized. Heads I win, tails you lose is great if you're me, awful if you're you. In the absence of a "guaranteed" bailout (if you're too big to fail, anyhow) we might enforce some restraint on the banks but it might take a very painful recession where a bunch of them fail to do so. Or the government could break them up and say "nobody is too big to fail now, so good luck!" and institute some kind of rule about deposit insurance and banks' total assets under management. Ultimately I'm not so much a "gold bug" who loves gold irrationally as I am someone who wants some kind of restraint on the government. There are probably other ways to do it, but at least by using older methods you get the benefit of a lot of history to read and to draw conclusions from. I'm open to other avenues of providing restraint, but they need to be distributed and not subject to the vagaries of elections. The people have precious few ways to directly influence the government given the way that politics have evolved, so any way to return some power to the people is a good thing in my mind. To me it seems like commodity money is a way to do that without turning the whole world upside down, but it wouldn't surprise me if we differed on that point. Anyhow thanks for the conversation, it's been nice to engage with someone on the issue rather than just get downvoted.