I decided to split this of from the longer thread.
NPR has a 5 minute video available for download
=========Money Mystery: Who's Holding U.S. Currency?
by David Kestenbaum
Listen Now [4 min 20 sec] add to playlist
{you will have to go to the web site to do this}
Morning Edition, January 9, 2009 · The federal government, which
tracks the amount of money it prints, says $900 billion of its
currency is in circulation. While experts have determined that
fully half of those U.S. dollars are being held in other
countries, a lot of cash is unaccounted for.
------------
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId ™147699
Unka' George [George McDuffee]
-------------------------------------------
He that will not apply new remedies,
must expect new evils:
for Time is the greatest innovator: and
if Time, of course, alter things to the worse,
and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better,
what shall be the end?
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman.
Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).
Is this where you tell us how China and the Arabs are waiting to
burn dollars that they never come back ? Nope look at this way,
you got foreign countries of peoples that decide they have had it
and decide to keep American money in the house because owning
a piece of America is good for our family. If you have 100 million
people world wide x $5000 that alone is five hundred billion
Regards,
John
John,
Good arithmatic, but that sadly that is not the case. This money is held by
major governments and corporations that are not necessarily overly freindly
to the US and the risk is that they decide NOT to hold it and spend it. That
would bury our economy and ultimately reduce the world to world war. We, the
citizens of the US are no longer controllers of our national destiny.
Steve
converted to bottom posting
On Sun, 11 Jan 2009 11:27:20 +0100, "Steve Lusardi"
-------------
Note the NPR article is talking about paper currency in
circulation [M0].
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_supply
When you include commercial bank "money" [m1-m2-m3] the numbers
are orders of magnitude larger.
* M0: currency (notes and coins) in circulation and in bank
vaults, plus reserves which commercial banks hold in their
accounts with the central bank (minimum reserves and excess
reserves). M0 is usually called the monetary base - the base from
which other forms of money (like checking deposits, listed below)
are created - and is traditionally the most liquid measure of the
money supply. [7]
* M1: currency in circulation + checkable deposits (checking
deposits, officially called demand deposits, and other deposits
that work like checking deposits) + traveler's checks. M1
represents the assets that strictly conform to the definition of
money: assets that can be used to pay for a good or service or to
repay debt. Although checks linked to checking deposits are
gradually becoming less popular, debit cards linked to these
deposits are becoming more popular. Like checks, debit cards, as
a means to complete a transaction through their links to
checkable deposits, can also be considered as a form of money.[8]
* M2: M1 + savings deposits, time deposits less than $100,000
and money market deposit accounts for individuals. M2 represents
money and "close substitutes" for money. [9] M2 is a key economic
indicator used to forecast inflation.[10]
* M3: M2 + large time deposits, institutional money-market
funds, short-term repurchase agreements, along with other larger
liquid assets. M3 is no longer measured by the US central
bank.[11]
When you include M3, the FRB alone has increased the money supply
by several trillion, and this is amplified by the magic of
fractional or reserve banking.
The only reason [apparently] this surge in M3 has not resulted in
gross inflation, is that this huge infusion of capital only
partially offsets the amount of capital/value that disappeared
when the stock/bond market fell and the CDOs and other financial
derivatives turned [or were discovered to be] "toxic."
As in many activities, international trade/finance, runs under
the golden rule, namely when you got the gold, you make the
rules.
It is well to remember that many of the more successful exporting
companies, and sovereign wealth funds could individually buy the
entire US automotive industry [GM, Ford, Chrysler] out of their
petty cash, and have plenty of money let over.
It is also well to remember that over the last few years, many of
our mundane but critical economic sectors [e.g. cement,
steel/rebar] have been largely or totally acquired by foreign
owners. Thus if Obama's "recovery through infrastructure
improvement" plan is implemented, most to all of the corporate
profits will accrue to foreign, not domestic, stockholders and
corporations. It is highly unlikely that "buy American"
requirements could reverse this, as either the required capacity
under American ownership no longer exists, and/or the WTO will
rule such provisions unlawful.
For years, we have operationally traded our more basic industries
[e.g textiles, shoes, consumer electronics, cement, utility steel
-- rebar], and other assets such as land and buildings in
exchange for cheap goods and services.
While this has been a disaster for most people, the Federal
government has "aided and abetted" this process every step of the
way because this also provides a huge pool of capital for it to
borrow at low rates.
It is only now that state and local governments are overtly
selling [or long term leasing] public assets such as roads and
airports in an effort to raise money to keep the good times
rolling (and the pols election coffers full).
Unka' George [George McDuffee]
-------------------------------------------
He that will not apply new remedies,
must expect new evils:
for Time is the greatest innovator: and
if Time, of course, alter things to the worse,
and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better,
what shall be the end?
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman.
Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).
On Sat, 10 Jan 2009 22:18:24 -0600, F. George McDuffee
And if you haven't heard this already, an explanation to the
mortgage fiasco in plain old english (59 minutes), that
helped to get us into this mess:
http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched 42
==
355: The Giant Pool of Money (05/09/2008)
A special program about the housing crisis produced in a
special collaboration with NPR News. We explain it all to
you. What does the housing crisis have to do with the
turmoil on Wall Street? Why did banks make half-million
dollar loans to people without jobs or income? And why is
everyone talking so much about the 1930s? It all comes back
to the Giant Pool of Money.
Act One.
This American Life producer Alex Blumberg teams up with
NPR's Adam Davidson for the entire hour to tell the
story—the surprisingly entertaining story—of how the U.S.
got itself into a housing crisis. They talk to people who
were actually working in the housing, banking, finance and
mortgage industries, about what they thought during the boom
times, and why the bust happened. And they explain that a
lot of it has to do with the giant global pool of money...
==
You may still be able to find it here, at least it was a
week or so ago (27mb):
http://rs371.rapidshare.com/files/118587041/TAL_The_Giant_Pool_of_Money.mp3
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