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Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

vollgeld-initiative.ch

21–30 of 33 posts

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#21
post #19
post #6

As somebody from Switzerland I think this is insane. I will vote against it. Honestly, most people who want this dont have a clue about monetary policy.

Do you mind elaborating on that statement?

Its the sort of argument that people make when they don't have a clue. This idea that banking and trading demand against banks is the problem is just fundamentally misguided.

There are many things we could improve in banking regulation and the way the central bank operates. This however, is just a uninformed populist campaign.

Most of the claims on their website are total nonsense based on all known economics.

I really hope Switzerland will not vote for this stupid initiative. I will vote against it for sure. That said, the Swiss population has a fairly good track record of shooting down these absurd ideas from the right and the left.

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#23
post #21
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mind elaborating on that statement?

Its the sort of argument that people make when they don't have a clue. This idea that banking and trading demand against banks is the problem is just fundamentally misguided. There are many things we could improve in banking regulation and the way the central bank operates. This however, is just a uninformed populist campaign. Most of the claims on their website are total nonsense based on all known economics. I real…

[deleted]

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#25
post #24

I don't see what this will actually change. If the SNB is the sole provider of money, whether electronic or currency, they will inevitably become the sole provider of loans, with the banks serving as brokers for those loans. Net zero game.

Personally I am peeved that I can’t individually make fractional reserve loans in genuine fungible currency (costs ~$30m to be a bank), so I’d like to choose a zero-sum point where the rich don’t get richer by default

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#26
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which means that banks, get to loan money they don't have in the fractional reserve bank system. So banks are levered up like you wouldn't believe, which is a huge weakness of the financial system. And what happens to all the profits from money printing ? Why, that goes to the banks, of course. This proposal seems to simply be to only allow the central bank to lever up, and force Swiss banks to become old-US-style "i…

There are no profits from 'printing' money. Those are simply the profits of being a bank. There are lots of regulation we should change about how banks work, but this proposal isn't one of them.

You are rejecting the negative connotation of the word “print” but the fact is that the bank can do a financial operation that would be illegal for a non-bank and which most humans would call printing money, and make a profit

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#27

I have to admit to not understanding this, though I think I know somewhat well about money. Isn't this "sovereign money" the way it is in other countries, where banks either have money deposited by some customers and/or borrowings from a central (government controlled) bank or reserve that controls the total amount of the currency/money? If banks create money on their own for lending, wouldn't that cause an uncontrol…

(please don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong) Say there are 3 customers at a single bank. Customer 1 = Investor, has 100 cash and deposits it into a bank account Customer 2 = Borrower, borrows 100 from the bank Customer 3 = Restaurant, provides a service for Borrower. Borrower pays a 100, and Restaurant deposits it to it's bank account. This is how the "sovereign money" travels: Investor -> Borrower -> Restauran…

Sort of, except that the bank can only lend out 90 of the 100 with, for example, a 10% reserve.

But in the end, that doesn't matter. The process is multiplicative, with a diminishing return.

Presuming that 10% reserve, when the restaurant deposits that 90, it can then serve as a reserve for the restaurant's own bank to lend out 81 which will then be deposited in someone else's bank. Now there is: the original 100, the 90, and the 81 all deposited as funds. 100 magically becomes 271, with the corresponding debt offsetting it. Rinse and repeat.

The reserve requirement is the only real brake on runaway inflation. With a 10% reserve, the theoretical maximum amount of money that could be created is 9X the original deposited amount. The formula for the multiplier is: 1 - (1 / reserve%). Of course, that's the theoretical maximum. It never goes quite that far.

But of course, then there's the interest that must somehow be paid. Interest is the only reason we have banks in the first place. It is why people deposit their money in banks, and it is how banks make their money. No interest, no banks, and (consequently) no loans. Since most money is actually created through loans, there is not enough money in the system to pay off the loans and the interest. The only way to pay back that interest is if loans continue to be made and the money supply perpetually expands. This is why we have central banks and government monetary policies.

Keep in mind, that this is all a simplification of the process. There are many layers to it, especially when the central banks get involved. Witness the Fed system in the US with the lending windows, T-bills, the role of government debt, etc. But it all boils down to the same thing when you strip the layers away.

If the sovereign currency referendum passes, the Swiss will inevitably have to deal with this problem. Their central bank will be forced to expand the money supply electronically in the form of loans made to banks, with an ever shrinking reserve. I just don't see this referendum making any difference whatsoever, except to centralize all debt.

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#28
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no profits from 'printing' money. Those are simply the profits of being a bank. There are lots of regulation we should change about how banks work, but this proposal isn't one of them.

You are rejecting the negative connotation of the word “print” but the fact is that the bank can do a financial operation that would be illegal for a non-bank and which most humans would call printing money, and make a profit

Well. Sure, but that the government who specifically wanted it like that because that has been the traditional role of banks and everything needs to be regulated. The government went out and gave licences to do that stuff to banks.

If you don't like that only some group of people is allowed to do something, then why not allow everybody to do it.

Now, of course some will say, that would be bad. Fair enough, but then again, you need to select the group that you will give that privilege too. Right now that is banks.

I would be perfectly happy to adopt a legal system where banks are not subject to extraordinary rules let the market decide who's debt is worth taking as 'money' but apparently most people in the world don't want that.

So really that argument leads you nowhere.

The question what is the goal of this initiative? For all the problems they have (or think they have) there is a pretty easy solution that one could adopt that require this essentially random solution.

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#29
post #24

I don't see what this will actually change. If the SNB is the sole provider of money, whether electronic or currency, they will inevitably become the sole provider of loans, with the banks serving as brokers for those loans. Net zero game.

The difference is, at least in theory, that boom-bust cycles from bank-fuelled speculative frenzies could be controlled.

Re: Switzerland: First country to have national referendum about Sovereign Money

#30

Does "Banks won’t be able to create money for themselves any more" mean the same as ending fractional reserve banking, or am I misunderstanding things?

There is no such thing as “fractional reserve banking”, the textbook models on banking taught in schools across the globe are dead wrong.

See:

Richard A. Werner, A lost century in economics: Three theories of banking and the conclusive evidence https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S105752191...

Richard A. Werner, Can banks individually create money out of nothing? — The theories and the empirical evidence https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S105752191...

Zoltan Jakab and Michael Kumhof, Banks are not intermediaries of loanable funds - and why this matters https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/working-paper/2015/banks-are...

German Bundesbank, Die Rolle von Banken, Nichtbanken und Zentralbank im Geldschöpfungsprozess https://www.bundesbank.de/Redaktion/DE/Downloads/Veroeffentl...

Piti Disyatat, The bank lending channel revisited https://www.bis.org/publ/work297.pdf

Beardsley Ruml, Taxes For Revenue Are Obsolete https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/542134

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