CONfidence Ponzi will run as long as until a certain % of the population becomes even the slightest bit awakened to how fiat currency is created, where it comes from and how it ultimately adversely impacts them and their standard of living and opportunity costs. This % doesn't necessarily need to be very high; if 10% or even 5% or so of the population essentially chose to opt out of the fractional reserve fiat currency game (see below as to how), this could be more than enough to cause critical problems for the fractional reserve banking scam & govermental confiscation schemes (U.S. citizens are really taxed at levels exceeding 90% when all fees, levels of taxations and inflation are taken into consideration). Moreover, if 5% became aware to the point that they chose to opt out, this would indicate a trend was underway whereby that % would soon be 15%, and 25%, and so forth (as the government tried to dig fire breaks, in what would then be a destined to fail bid to keep the Ponzi alive).
The last thing the fractional reserve central banks want is to have to fight alternate currencies, whether they're being used openly or underground, as this threatens their very existence, and also neuters their ability to affect the economy (if even only marginally) via monetary policy; this is why the Federal Reserve was given a monopoly on the creation and distribution of what is the only legal 'tender' for the payments of all debt, both public & private, via the use of Federal Reserve Notes (not dollars or greenbacks) having no inherent value other than a claim that the face value of the note will be honored by way of the full faith and credit clause; this is why barter is highly discouraged, why the wider spread the use of alternate (and real) money such as silver and gold coins is punished (and if the practice broadens enough, is always and inevitably made illegal, with confiscation likely); this is why the banking system as we now know it, with banks networked with the Federal Reserve, would completely collapse if Federal Reserve Notes had any significant competition, as no one would choose the DOZENS of layers of taxable events and transactional costs associated with using the monopoly fiat that is Federal Reserve Notes if they had any viable alternative; this is why Alan Greenspan wrote (prior to his time as an official and ultimately a Chairman of The non-Federal Reserve non-Bank) that gold was the ultimate enemy of the fractional reserve banking system, as its widespread use as currency would completely lay bare the confiscatory system of wealth robbing schemes, on many layers, that is a fractional reserve banking system, and why fractional reserve central bankers viewed gold with hostility, and would go to any lengths to ensure that it (or any other inherently valuable asset that could be used as alternate currency) would never be allowed to be supplant the use of Federal Reserve Notes; this is why central bankers do not highlight and grimace at open discussion of and attention paid to historical events whereby fiat was depegged from the gold standard, or events where any constraint on the ability of the central bank to conjure fiat from thin air at no cost to it was done away with (events such as Bretton Woods, or, even more fundamentally, the 1910 meeting on Jekyll Island, Georgia, whereby the Money Masters revived a central bank that had been killed three times prior).
Given a choice, if it were legal, rational people would choose to trade their skills, physical goods, etc. in exchange for those of others, as the transactional costs in doing so are de minimus, and the transactions yield far more efficient gains, free of fractional reserve parasitism and governmental 'middle man cuts.'
Think of this one example:
Mr. Smith is self-employed, and a very successful businessman. Let's say that he is a real estate developer. For every dollar of revenue that Mr. Smith generates, he will keep a mere 20 cents up until the time of his death, and after that time, every dollar he earned and saved will be reduced by well over 95%.
He pays a corporate and/or personal tax rate of at least 28% and as high as 36%, for starters. He then pays a tax to the state he lives in which could be ashigh as 12%. Every time he purchases something with each dollar, there is a general sales tax, with additional taxes on many purchases, such as gasoline, alcohol, etc. He pays tax on each piece of real estate, whether vacant, or with a structure of any kind on it. He pays a personal property tax. He pays a tax on his employees. He pays taxes and fees for licenses, permits, and other red tape schemes.
At just this point, he has had the federal, state and local authorities take in excess of 50% of each and every dollar he has generated through his work, ingenuity and industry.
After the 50%+ is put into a bank or other saving instrument, inflation of about 2.2% to 4% annually erodes his savings, and any interest or dividends are taxed by both the federal and state, again.
So, depending on for how long Mr. Smith lives, he will see another 15% to 30% loss on the money he has saved, on top of what was taken prior.
Then, at the time of his death, the government will take another massive amount from whatever he has managed to save, and that amount could be as high as 55% under current federal estate tax rates.
A NON-FRACTIONAL RESERVE FIAT system wouldn't allow the banks and the government to essentially swipe this insane amount of savings that was produced from individual effort in such an eggregious and punitive manner.
http://www.constitution.org/mon/greenspan_gold.htm
Realist - Everybody in America is soft, and hates conflict. The cure for this, both in politics and social life, is the same -- hardihood. Give them raw truth.
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