Sunday, December 5, 2010

How to Start the Next American Revolution

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
-Thomas Jefferson

Late night philosophizing and researching led me to this Q&A section with the founders of PayPal. In the video, Peter Thiel talks about how PayPal is NOT a bank but is a payment processor. They do not engage in fractional reserve lending.

The implication of this is huge. PayPal is the ONLY "full-reserve bank" in existence. They do not need FDIC insurance because they do not make any loans. PayPal cannot have a bank run by design.

Eric Cantana called for a European bank revolt via a withdrawal of funds into cash. That is highly unfeasible because digital cash and electronic payment is a necessity of modern life. Instead:

  1. Setup a PayPal account
  2. Sign up for a PayPal debit card so you can use your PayPal funds for daily purchases, etc
  3. Withdraw all your funds from your Bank of America or other "Too Big to Fail" banks to PayPal
  4. Use your Paypal funds to buy a physical ounce of silver or gold to put more pain to the COMEX naked short sellers. Hat-tip of this idea to Max Keiser of the Keiser Report.
I am not against fractional-reserve lending because they provide a vital service to the economy: investing and lending. I am against the fractional-reserve lenders and investment bankers putting a gun to Congress's head and demanding bailouts and threatening that "the economy will get it" if they don't get their way.

If we have enough of them, full-reserve banks will provide a stable platform to rebuild an economy in case of the black-swan event case that investment banks and fractional-reserve lenders take too much risk and start blowing up.

The revolution starts now, carpe diem.

UPDATE: I have since found that PayPal simply stores their excess cash in a commercial banking account which makes them prone to failure as well. There truly is no "full-reserve bank" available to keep your money safe.

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