Found another article

July 15, 2012 at 8:05 am #86763

Keymaster

Found another article accepting the myth that banks can create money out of nothing. This time endorsed by Green Party MP Caroline Lucas. The incriminating passage reads:

Quote:

central banks only create 3% of the money supply. Normally, 97% is created by banks through their extension of bank credit. If you wonder how this works: banks simply pretend that borrowers have deposited the money that they lend them, and thus create it out of nothing when they credit their deposit accounts, adding to the money supply.

This is to misinterpret double-entry book-keeping. Under this the “liability” (the loan) has to be matched by a corresponding “asset” (the borrower’s debt to the bank). No extra money (purchasing power) is created. It’s just a book entry and of course the bank has to already have the money to make the loan.Note that the article contradicts itself by talking about the Bank of England creating £275bn extra money apart from the 3% mentioned (which are notes and coins).Two points. First, central banks can create more money (additional nominal purchasing power) out of nothing (though if they create too much this will devalue previously existing money). But individual banks can’t (they have to have the money first before they can make a loan, even if they get it from the central bank as in the recently announced scheme to get banks to relend money to small businesses). Second, if you define “bank loans” as “money” then by definition banks create money (but not out of nothing).The Green Party obviously doesn’t mind making a laughing stock of itself. Their way out of the crisis? The Bank of England financing cycle paths in every city ….