--for some enterprising economics student to calculate the amount of wealth stolen each year through fractional reserve banking.
It would go something like this: The amount of cash and savings and checkings deposits in Cootersville is ten million dollars. (We exclude real estate and stocks and bonds and the like because, despite the value of the currency in which they are traded, they will still retain their value.) If the money supply is increased (inflated) by five percent in a year, then it would seem that five hundred thousand dollars were stolen from the people of Cootersville by the Penny Shiners and their conspirators in "government."
It is difficult to calculate the theft because the Penny Shiners have made the M3 figure a big secret.
Just imagine: It's like the Russkies in 1950 driving tanks down the street and stealing five percent of the savings of Americans at gunpoint each year. Would you be outraged? Fractional reserve banking is just an elegant scheme of thievery. And it's less detectable by the common man than anything those nasty, ol' Russkies could dream up.
What would Americans' standard of living be like today if some foreign power had not been stealing a certain percentage of your wealth each year?
