By Ellen Brown / Original to ScheerPost

Foreign critics have long chafed at the “exorbitant privilege” of the U.S. dollar as global reserve currency. The U.S. can issue this currency backed by nothing but the “full faith and credit of the United States.” Foreign governments, needing dollars, not only accept them in trade but buy U.S. securities with them, effectively funding the U.S. government and its foreign wars. But no government has been powerful enough to break that arrangement – until now. How did that happen and what will it mean for the U.S. and global economies?

First, some history: The U.S. dollar was adopted as the global reserve currency at the Bretton Woods Conference in 1944, when the dollar was still backed by gold on global markets. The agreement was that gold and the dollar would be accepted interchangeably as global reserves, the dollars to be redeemable in gold on demand at $35 an ounce. Exchange rates of other currencies were fixed against the dollar. 

But that deal was broken after President Lyndon Johnson’s “guns and butter” policy exhausted the U.S. kitty by funding war in Vietnam along with his “Great Society” social programs at home. French President Charles de Gaulle, suspecting the U.S. was running out of money, cashed in a major portion of France’s dollars for gold and threatened to cash in the rest; and other countries followed suit or threatened to. 

In 1971, President Richard Nixon ended the convertibility of the dollar to gold internationally (known as “closing the gold window”), in order to avoid draining U.S. gold reserves. The value of the dollar then plummeted relative to other currencies on global exchanges. To prop it up, Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger made a deal with Saudi Arabia and the OPEC countries that OPEC would sell oil only in dollars, and that the dollars would be deposited in Wall Street and City of London banks. In return, the U.S. would defend the OPEC countries militarily. Economic researcher William Engdahl also presents evidence of a promise that the price of oil would be quadrupled. An oil crisis triggered by a brief Middle Eastern war did cause the price of oil to quadruple, and the OPEC agreement was finalized in 1974.

The deal held firm until 2000, when Saddam Hussein broke it by selling Iraqi oil in euros. Libyan president Omar Qaddafi followed suit. Both presidents wound up assassinated, and their countries were decimated in war with the United States. Canadian researcher Matthew Ehret observes:

We should not forget that the Sudan-Libya-Egypt alliance under the combined leadership of Mubarak, Qadhafi and Bashir, had moved to establish a new gold-backed financial system outside of the IMF/World Bank to fund large scale development in Africa. Had this program not been undermined by a NATO-led destruction of Libya, the carving up of Sudan and regime change in Egypt, then the world would have seen the emergence of a major regional block of African states shaping their own destinies outside of the rigged game of Anglo-American controlled finance for the first time in history.

The first challenge by a major power to what became known as the petrodollar has come in 2022. In the month after the Ukraine conflict began, the U.S. and its European allies imposed heavy financial sanctions on Russia in response to the illegal military invasion. The Western measures included freezing nearly half of the Russian central bank’s 640 billion U.S. dollars in financial reserves, expelling several of Russia’s largest banks from the SWIFT global payment system, imposing export controls aimed at limiting Russia’s access to advanced technologies, closing down their airspace and ports to Russian planes and ships, and instituting personal sanctions against senior Russian officials and high-profile tycoons. Worried Russians rushed to withdraw rubles from their banks, and the value of the ruble plunged on global markets just as the U.S. dollar had in the early 1970s. 

The trust placed in the U.S. dollar as global reserve currency, backed by “the full faith and credit of the United States,” had finally been fully broken. Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a speech on March 16 that the U.S. and EU had defaulted on their obligations, and that freezing Russia’s reserves marks the end of the reliability of so-called first class assets. On March 23, Putin announced that Russia’s natural gas would be sold to “unfriendly countries” only in Russian rubles, rather than the euros or dollars currently used. Forty-eight nations are counted by Russia as “unfriendly,” including the United States, Britain, Ukraine, Switzerland, South Korea, Singapore, Norway, Canada and Japan. 

Putin noted that more than half the global population remains “friendly” to Russia. Countries not voting to support the sanctions include two major powers – China and India – along with major oil producer Venezuela, Turkey, and other countries in the “Global South.” “Friendly” countries, said Putin, could now buy from Russia in various currencies.

On March 24, Russian lawmaker Pavel Zavalny said at a news conference that gas could be sold to the West for rubles or gold, and to “friendly” countries for either national currency or bitcoin.

Energy ministers from the G7 nations rejected Putin’s demand, claiming it violated gas contract terms requiring sale in euros or dollars. But on March 28, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia was “not engaged in charity” and won’t supply gas to Europe for free (which it would be doing if sales were in euros or dollars it cannot currently use in trade). Sanctions themselves are a breach of the agreement to honor the currencies on global markets. 

Bloomberg reports that on March 30, Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of the lower Russian house of parliament, suggested in a Telegram post that Russia may expand the list of commodities for which it demands payment from the West in rubles (or gold) to include grain, oil, metals and more. Russia’s economy is much smaller than that of the U.S. and the European Union, but Russia is a major global supplier of key commodities – including not just oil, natural gas and grains, but timber, fertilizers, nickel, titanium, palladium, coal, nitrogen, and rare earth metals used in the production of computer chips, electric vehicles and airplanes. 

On April 2, Russian gas giant Gazprom officially halted all deliveries to Europe via the Yamal-Europe pipeline, a critical artery for European energy supplies.

U.K. professor of economics Richard Werner calls the Russian move a clever one – a replay of what the U.S. did in the 1970s. To get Russian commodities, “unfriendly” countries will have to buy rubles, driving up the value of the ruble on global exchanges just as the need for petrodollars propped up the U.S. dollar after 1973. Indeed, by March 30, the ruble had already risen to where it was a month earlier. 

Russia is following the U.S. not just in hitching its national currency to sales of a critical commodity but in an earlier protocol – what 19th century American leaders called the “American System” of sovereign money and credit. Its three pillars were (a) federal subsidies for internal improvements and to nurture the nation’s fledgling industries, (b) tariffs to protect those industries, and (c) easy credit issued by a national bank.

Michael Hudson,  a research professor of economics and author of “Super-Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of American Empire” among many other books, notes that the sanctions are forcing Russia to do what it has been reluctant to do itself – cut reliance on imports and develop its own industries and infrastructure. The effect, he says, is equivalent to that of protective tariffs. In an article titled “The American Empire Self-destructs,” Hudson writes of the Russian sanctions (which actually date back to 2014): 

Russia had remained too enthralled by free-market ideology to take steps to protect its own agriculture or industry. The United States provided the help that was needed by imposing domestic self-reliance on Russia (via sanctions). When the Baltic states lost the Russian market for cheese and other farm products, Russia quickly created its own cheese and dairy sector – while becoming the world’s leading grain exporter.

Russia is discovering (or is on the verge of discovering) that it does not need U.S. dollars as backing for the ruble’s exchange rate. Its central bank can create the rubles needed to pay domestic wages and finance capital formation. The U.S. confiscations thus may finally lead Russia to end neoliberal monetary philosophy, as Sergei Glaziev has long been advocating in favor of MMT [Modern Monetary Theory]. …

What foreign countries have not done for themselves – replacing the IMF, World Bank and other arms of U.S. diplomacy – American politicians are forcing them to do. Instead of European, Near Eastern and Global South countries breaking away out of their own calculation of their long-term economic interests, America is driving them away, as it has done with Russia and China. 

Sergei Glazyev, mentioned by Hudson above, is a former adviser to President Vladimir Putin and the Minister for Integration and Macroeconomics of the Eurasia Economic Commission, the regulatory body of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU). He has proposed using tools similar to those of the “American System,” including converting the Central Bank of Russia to a “national bank” issuing Russia’s own currency and credit for internal development. On February 25, Glazyev published an analysis of U.S. sanctions titled “Sanctions and Sovereignty,” in which he stated:

[T]he damage caused by US financial sanctions is inextricably linked to the monetary policy of the Bank of Russia  …. Its essence boils down to a tight binding of the ruble issue to export earnings, and the ruble exchange rate to the dollar. In fact, an artificial shortage of money is being created in the economy, and the strict policy of the Central Bank leads to an increase in the cost of lending, which kills business activity and hinders the development of infrastructure in the country.

Glazyev said that if the central bank replaced the loans withdrawn by its Western partners with its own loans, Russian credit capacity would greatly increase, preventing a decline in economic activity without creating inflation.   

Russia has agreed to sell oil to India in India’s own sovereign currency, the rupee; to China in yuan; and to Turkey in lira. These national currencies can then be spent on the goods and services sold by those countries. Arguably, every country should be able to trade in global markets in its own sovereign currency; that is what a fiat currency is – a medium of exchange backed by the agreement of the people to accept it at value for their goods and services, backed by the “full faith and credit” of the nation. 

But that sort of global barter system would break down just as local barter systems do, if one party to the trade did not want the goods or services of the other party. In that case, some intermediate reserve currency would be necessary to serve as a medium of exchange. 

Glazyev and his counterparts are working on that. In a translated interview posted on The Saker, Glazyev stated:

We are currently working on a draft international agreement on the introduction of a new world settlement currency, pegged to the national currencies of the participating countries and to exchange-traded goods that determine real values. We won’t need American and European banks. A new payment system based on modern digital technologies with a blockchain is developing in the world, where banks are losing their importance. 

Russia and China have both developed alternatives to the SWIFT messaging system from which certain   Russian banks have been blocked. London-based commentator Alexander Mercouris makes the interesting observation that going outside SWIFT means Western banks cannot track Russian and Chinese trades.

Geopolitical analyst Pepe Escobar sums up the plans for a Eurasian/China financial reset in an article titled “Say Hello to Russian Gold and Chinese Petroyuan.” He writes:

It was a long time coming, but finally some key lineaments of the multipolar world’s new foundations are being revealed.

On Friday [March 11], after a videoconference meeting, the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and China agreed to design the mechanism for an independent international monetary and financial system. The EAEU consists of Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Belarus and Armenia, is establishing free trade deals with other Eurasian nations, and is progressively interconnecting with the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

For all practical purposes, the idea comes from Sergei Glazyev, Russia’s foremost independent economist ….

Quite diplomatically, Glazyev attributed the fruition of the idea to “the common challenges and risks associated with the global economic slowdown and restrictive measures against the EAEU states and China.” 

Translation: as China is as much a Eurasian power as Russia, they need to coordinate their strategies to bypass the US unipolar system.

The Eurasian system will be based on “a new international currency,” most probably with the yuan as reference, calculated as an index of the national currencies of the participating countries, as well as commodity prices. … 

The Eurasian system is bound to become a serious alternative to the US dollar, as the EAEU may attract not only nations that have joined BRI … but also the leading players in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) as well as ASEAN. West Asian actors – Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon – will be inevitably interested.

If that system succeeds, what will the effect be on the U.S. economy? Investment strategist Lynn Alden writes in a detailed analysis titled “The Fraying of the US Global Currency Reserve System” that there will be short-term pain, but, in the long run, it will benefit the U.S. economy. The subject is complicated, but the bottom line is that reserve currency dominance has resulted in the destruction of our manufacturing base and the buildup of a massive federal debt. Sharing the reserve currency load would have the effect that sanctions are having on the Russian economy – nurturing domestic industries as a tariff would, allowing the American manufacturing base to be rebuilt. 

Other commentators also say that being the sole global reserve currency is less an exorbitant privilege than an exorbitant burden. Losing that status would not end the importance of the U.S. dollar, which is too heavily embedded in global finance to be dislodged. But it could well mean the end of the petrodollar as sole global reserve currency, and the end of the devastating petroleum wars it has funded to maintain its dominance. 

Key point: “Sharing the reserve currency load would have the effect that sanctions are having on the Russian economy – nurturing domestic industries as a tariff would, allowing the American manufacturing base to be rebuilt. ”

Here’s the opportunity for the newly-aroused US labor movement to restore its power, as employers seek workers for the new manufacturing facilities. At all costs, the capitalists must be prevented from creating sold-out unions and other con job ploys.

For sure there are corporate “task forces”already thinking these things over.

An insightful assessment and instructive historical precedent raised in this modern context.

I agree. The millennials have a great opportunity to unionize because massive numbers of baby boomers retired during the last 2 years of the pandemic. Good luck to all current workers! Follow the example of the employees at the amazon facility in N.Y. city.

This is written by someone promoting state banking who seems to have missed the all important watershed event that took place right at the end of 1974, on Dec 31. Executive order 11825 reinstated the US residents’ privilege to own and use their own sovereign gold which reversed what took place during the FDR admin in the 1930’s. You’ll take note that gold can only be properly monetized by the marketplace on the basis of the price also being governed by the marketplace. Bretton Woods was the re-engineering process to bring about a price model that was both liquid and supportive of debt-free transactions.

Why was this left out when Americans are able to monetize and spend their onw sovereign debt-free bullion in support of real economic growth ? The American government put it right in everyone’s face but it appears that Americans fell asleep as did the author of this piece.

https://www.usgoldbureau.com/gold-confiscation

Actually I considered adding the gold issue but it would have made an already long article way too long. What I thought was particularly interesting was that Russia is putting a floor under the gold price and basically destroying the derivatives manipulation of the price. But it’s a very complicated subject. Here are a couple of links for interest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ0XM8fufOQ and https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/paradigm-shift-western-media-hasnt-grasped-yet-russian-ruble-relaunched-linked-gold-and?utm_source=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=583 Conclusion from the latter: “The Bank of Russia’s move to link the ruble to gold and link commodity payments to the ruble is a paradigm shift that the western media has not really yet been grasped. As the dominos fall, these events could reverberate in different ways. Increased demand for physical gold. Blowups in the paper gold markets. A revalued gold price. A shift away from the US dollar. Increased bilateral trade in commodities among non-Western counties in currencies other than the US dollar.”

You’re not paying much attention to the elephant in the room, Ellen. It can be difficult to see unless you factor in eCommerce. It’s not the USD currency but the USD price tool at “the other end” which is the “measure of measures” in the global price model and the only price tool for global bullion. Are you aware that the combination of gold backed market currency with real-time USD pricing (usd/gm) is now transacting on the blockchain ? Silver too.

Why should the USD measurement tool for value waste much more time measuring the value of oil that goes up in smoke when the dollar can measure the trade value of flowing MARKET gold in the support of real economic growth ??? Gold currency can go round and round and round and round and round…. etc, etc.

Bye-bye petrodollar, hello 21st century fishes and loaves. Oil was simply a stand-in as the object of the dollar’s scalable pricing apprenticeship as a “floater” back in the 1970’s when the market gold-as-money relationship wasn’t quite ready. The price of gold (buying power) would have to become measurably scalable before the gold ownership mortarium was lifted, which goes to Executive order 11825.

The dollar is more vital than ever now, not some much as a currency but as a real-time price tool for scalable liquidity and dynamic market balancing that’s needed with debt-free trading.

The west has been following the monetary law of weights and measures since Bretton Woods and the learning experience that goes back to the gold standard as it was configured with the fixed price peg in the 1930’s. The re-engineering of the global price model would be a huge key to any future success gold would have as market based money. The economy is a real-time event. There’s the self evident fact that we have to form congruence with. Without real-time pricing , this congruence with REALITY could never take place and we would simply remain economically dysfunctional.

We’re on the threshold of something truly remarkable if the market supports it.

Ellen, great article & nice reply to a trollish gold bug. I thought the only thing you missed is the fact that the whole mess is a symptom of kleptocracy’s underlying problem (unfair trade, etc , maintained by the parasitic debt-for-profit currency scam run by the biggest bankers & kleptocrats. Yet, thankfully, somebody in a position of sufficient power wants to solve part of the problem. Glazyev clearly understands it &, apparently, so do the rulers of the nations tired of playing the Fed’s pyramid game (propped up by the ever more fragile house of derivative cards). So, I predict that the most important change to come will be rapid maturation, evolution, and sustainable usefulness of crypto alternatives to the neo-Feudal faux-money system. After all, as V.I. Lenin clearly realized, “The surest way to destroy a capitalist economy is to debauch it’s currency.” Of course, the Fed has done it for him from the start. Yet, which non-US kleptocrats wants to go down with his ship if state, eh? Also, I see no gold bugs or crypto hedgers who want pass up great deals while avoiding excess volatility & risks. So, the essentially negative, parasitic nature of the financialists’ global country club casino will keep driving ever more players to better alternatives, with the best available odds. I hope that makes sense. If it doesn’t, check out my current draft of “Civilization or Dystopia” @ my website.

That’s quite an imagination. It could and would greatly improve if you fully understood the USD and how it’s supporting debt-free transactions now within the world of eCommerce, all market driven too. I’m hardly a troll when I have positive and proactive contributions to make for the focal point of real-economic growth, don’t you think ? We’re right on the threshold of a whole new paradigm for how people in the free market trade for goods and services.

The twain between market gold and the USD now meets in real-time —->>> USD/oz

Render unto Caesar …. render unto God. Maybe I’ll see you on the “other side” someday. 🙂

To Michael, “…. supporting debt-free transactions now within the world of eCommerce,” Debt free, eh, ha,ha, that’s a good one – unless, of course, you mean the virtual world of e-commerce ” all market driven”, another acolyte of the most pervasive and deeply rooted fundamentalism in this country – Market Fundamentalism “whole new paradigm” – you seem to be a be a bit short on details “Render unto Caesar …” Indeed, some of these “market kings” seem to be evading what they owe to Caesar …

Debt-free transactions using market gold and silver bullion now take place daily . Stick to the use of IOU’s if you like.

What working American has a gold stash? Not many. Sounds like libertarian BS.

The law is the law and the laws says you don’t have to be a debt dealer who supports inflation and high taxation. Do what you like but take responsibility for your choice.

Ellen should have made it clear that unfriendly buyers of Russian resources are able to pay in USD or euro it’s just that they deposit funds directly into the Russian banks, rather than into western bank accounts where the funds would be frozen, which is what Russia means by saying that they are not prepared to make a gift of their produce to unfriendly buyers.

Not sure what Onkle Schwab has to say.

US hegemony is not about dominating the currency model insomuch as it is about being a global “measure of measures” in the global PRICE model which now supports debt-free economic transactions in the marketplace.

Not quite sure what you mean, but I agree the dollar is not going away as a major global medium of exchange/measure of value/store of value.

Maybe we should think about evolving beyond a debt-based monetary-system, to something more like a resource-based economy. Who needs currency-wars replacing petro-wars?

Lucid comment. The reality is that we are, right now, at this moment. If you haven’t seen the evidence, it’s only because you may not have looked in the right place.

The monetization of debt-free market based money such as gold and silver require real-time market prices which is something we now have. The debt bubble and its progression is now massive almost beyond comprehension for many. We don’t have a challenge to monetize gold and silver with user friendly methods for its use. We have a challenge on how to introduce it without a knee jerk reaction taking place in the debt based legacy markets. A top-down introduction would create a certain rush to judgement, most likely leading to a massive pop and this is what has to be avoided. We need a safe and sane leak, one that rides on the back of REAL ECONOMIC GROWTH, the whole end in mind.

When adding the “monetary Yang to the monetary Yin” as a process to completion, we cannot destroy the Yin in the process. We need both. For this reason, the introduction process for gold and silver backed digital medium has to be bottom up with an organic governance that can only be properly managed by the free market. It’s the consumer who now has the monetary stage and the legal portion of this front-ran the whole market manifestation when Executive Order 11825 was written in late 1974.

The monetary law of weights and measures could only come to fruition on the back of real-time market pricing to be congruent with economic reality. (USD/oz) The economy is a real-time event. Always ! Congruence with this reality in how we price (measure value) and how we transact is mandatory. The law is unyielding !

Again, seeing some evidence and/or references would help (to provide credibility, if possible).

Gold and silver backed digital tokens are transacting on the blockchain with merchant tools just having been released quite recently. The blockchain has complete transparency.

You can have a much closer look by registering within the LODE eco system. I can only lead a horse to water, right ?

Sorry, no promotional links like that, please.

I was asked for transparency. How can I provide that without a link ? Can you manage to jump out into a greater possibility for your justification ? Is this a site geared to keeping people locked into a debt paradigm ? I’m not hearing anything about true free market debt-free transactions other than what I’m contributing .

And all I’m seeing is your assertion that there are “debt-free market transactions” – with no back up for those assertions

Someone isn’t allowing me to provide that transparency. I tried. What is it that you don’t understand about real-time pricing comparisons ? On the basis of agreement for pricing, a debt-free widget priced at $2.95 USD can trade without the use of debt for another debt-free widget also priced at $2.95. Gold is a debt-free widget and a good place to begin….. silver too.

Second and last warning. Please don’t promote products. Links to opinion/news is usually OK.

Fine. In tat case, why don’t you feed and prompt the discussion on the basis of debt-free market based trades ? Over to you.

To Michael, And how much crypto do you own, Michael?

I have some silver tokens, poor man’s money .. LOL. I don’t plan on owning much but will scale up as the adoption gets greater and more merchants are accepting of the digital bullion backed payments. I think of it as my “checking account” as opposed to my savings account which is my other bullion in my personal possession. My motto s, “go wild … buy a gram or two”. It’s better than high inflation and associated taxation.

So you are promoting the adoption of tokens that you own – with plans to “scale up” as the adoption increases – are the tokens also in your “personal possession”?

Sorry, as a salesman you haven’t sold me ….

….. the tokens are on the blockchain. As a mass based token, they’re the proxy for the full bullion backing. They transact daily now and have begun to attract merchants. Without a physical backing for stability, merchants have shied away from digital currencies that are simply created by algorithms without any physical bullion weighting.

actually, there is another, critical issue. The US ,with the dollar as the reserve currency, has been able to control international trade transactions by setting the terms and refusing to participate unless it has the dominant position. This has been a significant “club” to control development finance and has led to many problems with the ability to use the IMF and WB as enforcers. John Perkin’s many descriptions of such play in his books “confessions of an economic hit man,” are paradigmatic examples.

Thanks Tom. And we shouldn’t feel bad if we lose that club. It’s not we the people who benefit, it’s the global financiers. A fair global system will benefit people everywhere — in the long run, as Lyn Alden says.

Bravo!!! Great point & key issue Thanks for posting.

agree, the club has to be broken

International trade through the BIS and SWIFT and other unregulated privately held financial institutions like IMF, Visa, PayPal et al controlled by banksters are the clubs. If BIS’ private board decided not to follow the US sanction regime, there would be no santions. In 1995 gasoline in Cuba cost $7/ liter or $28/gal because the USSR had collapsed and Cuba was sanctioned. I asked a Cuban professor: “Why didn’t Cuba switch to ethanol? They had sugar cane and distilling facilities already and Brazil had switched long ago.” She replied that she had asked but had received no answer. After reading Ellen’s book, “Web of Debt”, I surmised that BIS told Cuba that if they did the demonstration to show others how to avoid the petrodollar, all international trade would be halted. Cuba still imported much of its food. Every community could produce its own fuel. The amount of ethanol potential in food and yard waste could put Chevron out of business as well as put a huge damper on bankster’s profits and that is why we keep hearing about EVs. Today all cars can use 50% ethanol. With a software download 100% ethanol can be used.

Great article, Ellen. I talk about this on my Substack article that quotes from Scott Ritter and Michael Hudson: https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/putin-peace-petrodollar-pain where I say that the petroruble is Putin’s Omicron to end the West NATO virus. And another one: https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/ukranian-peace-and-us-petropocalypse. They analyze the impact on the US and whether it may be the impetus for the public banking local economies that we both want. I’ll certainly be using your data in the next one I do on this.

We suggest the end of American dollar supremacy will mean the end of empire. The end of at least 500 years of chattel slavery, colonialism, neo-colonialism, White supremacy and neoliberalism.

We see no set of circumstances where there will be an American industrial renaissance. Where anything less than perdition will inure. For these fallacious notions stare in the face of the right order of things. The notion that an American regime built on racism, as still centrally enshrined and all the crimes coming there from, should never be balanced.

For us, this is more than a purely financialization issue. It has to do with the new age as devined by forces beyond the schemes of mere mortals.

Will the vile, technically advanced bankster governments dare to counterfeit rubles?

I don’t see any real evidence that the gas has actually been shut off to Europe yet. RT has not reported that. Can’t find any mainstream article in Europe or the US reporting it either.

There is this from 2 days ago — https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/gazprom-halts-gas-shipments-europe-critical-pipeline

Thank you Ellen for your insight and sharing your thoughts on this matter. Certainly the economic structure of the world is changing and along with that change comes a threat of a trade war that leads to less harmony in the world. The quest for economic power and the development of that power within regions of the world become up for grabs when this quest for the almighty currency is at stake. Also one must consider the fluctuations of the value considering the underlying structure. We can only hope for a common solution to promote world order and peace.

Yes, “the people don’t want war.” The people want peace, prosperity, goodwill. Unfortunately the people aren’t in control. Hopefully solutions can be found, as you say.

The problem in the Western World is it’s Tax System and only measuring with GDP a fraction of the a Nations total economic and financial activity. The Tax System makes the West uncompetitive against China which has funded China to become the Worlds Super Power. The West must replace existing TAXES with LIBERTY TAX and replace GDP with ACOO i.e. All Changes of Ownership. This can STOP China, Russia and BRICS and force their Leaders to turn inwards to protect themselves from their own People they are KNOWN to FEAR

The West is also uncompetitive because Eurasian governments subsidize education, medical care, transportation, and more, relieving producers of those costs.

“If your plan is for one year plant rice. If your plan is for ten years plant trees. If your plan is for one hundred years educate children. ”

― Confucius Ellen I am not as optimistic of the outcome for the USA. Even if, and that is a big ‘if’, the rest of the world do not take revenge for 70 years of blatant ‘bullying and theft’ by boycotting their goods, I do not think that the US can operate or recover without significant input from other countries, and what does the US offer in return? Intellectual Property is going to be taken without recompense, and quite honestly, contrary to American opinion, it is not worth that much to begin with. No other commodity is dependant on USA resources. It can be obtained cheaper elsewhere. USA products no longer are exceptional value, everyone else has caught up and surpassed them in quality. USA materialism and the motivation by greed and fear is being replaced in many (most?) societies by a more socialistic outlook. I noticed in Eastern Europe a great ‘nostalgia’ for communist ideals. In Muslim countries there is a far greater pressure to protect the children, aged and even just plain incapable. Europe ‘goes along’ with the USA but does not, except for a very few, share it’s values. “Pride cometh before a fall” and I think that 100 years of USA ‘exceptionality’ is about to receive ‘payback’, and all the output of Madison Avenue, is not going to save it. Thank you for your banking and economic articles, they make sense and they are pretty much the only English language one’s that do. The rest seem to live in a Keynesian ‘LaLa Land’ in which tomorrow never comes.

Thank you! I have thought the same since the 1970’s when the push for a free market economy reversed public investment in education while still requiring employers to try to give health care & other benefits to their employees that other competitors received at a flat rate (through taxes) from their governments. It forced U.S. companies to move overseas. Also, the reduction in the marginal tax rate gave many dollars to companies to expand in other countries without the penalty of paying high taxes to invest in other countries instead of investing in their U.S. operations without paying the marginal tax rate.

Given Russia’s and China’s accelerated efforts to create a financial infrastructure independent of the West prior to these latest round of sanctions, I’m curious to know how much of this move away from the dollar was anticipated by U.S. financial leaders?

It would seem that de-dollarization and financial independence would be a logical step by some non-western nations, especially in light of the U.S. theft of Russia’s dollar reserves, and, I speculate, must have been expected, if not encouraged, by U.S. policy makers.

If that’s the case, to what extent, if any, is this a domestic effort to hasten the demise of the dollar and associated debt burden, and clear the way for a digital money system?

Oh crap….. that never occurred too me. If we move to digital money we the people are screwed. They could turn it off over any disagreement, dissent, action. Anything.

If we the people agreed to one or a few crypto currencies created by us and backed by for example sustainably energy, we the people control the financial markets and free ourselves. Modern barder economy will rule, a totally and free market will arise, without any form of subsidy schemes.

Why does my comment require moderation and who is competent to do this?

All comments on here are moderated and I am one of two anonymous moderators of this site, currently, whether competent to your standards or not.

Without this extremely light moderation, we can’t have comments at all as spam, bullying and incessant self-promotion quickly make the space a dumpster fire ignored by most readers.

Why would anyone who has ever spent any time with on-line discussions even have to ask?!

As for “my comment,” it isn’t just yours. People who’ve been here quite awhile go through the same process. “Who’s competent” seems to imply someone who believes his (I bet it’s”he”) academic credentials, professional status, knowledge, creativity, or whatever rates the privilege of exemption from mere gatekeepers.

IMHO you mods are doing a terrific job. That must require a lot of reading that has to be done quickly. Sometimes, as is the case with this thread, of very complex issues. No way do you censor differing opinions. But personal attacks, someone selling their own work, and duplicate posts shouldn’t be allowed.

The occasional apologist for the Dem party Ivy elite gets through. One in a great while so do Randroid libertarians, and very rarely, right wing Trump fanboys or other varieties of hostile Rs. We here are capable of shredding their illogical arguments. But because the mods are vigilant, we’re spared having to deal with trolls.

Thank you for sparing us the nonsense that passes as comments elsewhere. I for one really do appreciate it.

Don’t know but mine do too, and I’m the author. It’s not my blog. 🙂

Yes, Russia can sidestep America, good. Create a similar system , bad for the West. Which will cause WW3, Third Woe. .maybe started..

With all due respect, Ellen and commentors are wearing blinders, only considering the economic situation. The “banksters” and “bad economics” are only two of 20 some “props” I have identified from my research that the superior power elite of America’s corporations and the subordinate power elite of government trade each other to keep and expand their power. Even a retired general and former director of the CIA and NSA candidly admitted that those two agencies “are gathering data to make America more profitable for more commercial enterprises, [1`] Nothing startling about that admission. Major General Smedley Butler’s experience with WWI led him to conclude that “war is a racket.”

My overall point is that America’s evil elite are leading humanity to doomsday later this century if those props are not toppled peacefully and legally. And I have shown how it can be done.

I forgot to add that there are several forms of good capitalism as opposed to the bad capitalism Americans have suffered interminably, and have written elsewhere about several brilliant non-economist thinkers who have proposed workable forms of good capitalism. Ellen’s PBI initiative, which I have always supported and have recommend in my books, is a form of good capitalism, but it is insufficiently encompassing in contrast, for example, of models of “shared capitalism,” and “natural capitalism,” to mention just a few examples.

Gary, Insofar as capitalism re quires “infinite growth” on a finite planet, there cannot be “good” capitalism

Conservation, recycling, energy efficiency and environmental clean-up are all part of growth. I don’t see limitations on growth at all unless the model for liquidity cannot allow for it. We don’t have a capacity problem for growth. We have a debt problem that simply stands in the way of further progress.

To Michael, As “Liquidity refers to the efficiency or ease with which an asset or security can be converted into ready cash without affecting its market price.”, and ” Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit” can you explain to me what “model of liquidity” within this system can incorporate “Conservation, recycling, energy efficiency and environmental clean-up”

Sound like a bankers definition to me. Why be so limiting ?

Liquidity refers to the efficiency or ease with which an asset or security can be converted into ready cash or another asset without the use of cash/fiat currency and without affecting its market price.”,

Just compare prices in real-time and make the debt-free swap on the basis of price agreement . These are the trades that have begun with the use of market gold and silver within eCommerce. Consider the classical measure of gold trading for a man’s new suit.

Thank you, Ellen Brown, for the clearest, fact based explanation of what’s been happening the last 30 years that I have read. I can now understand. I hope many others read it.

I’d like to suggest/ask if it would not make more sense to peg currency for exchanging goods and services all indirectly the product of labor time, to international units in which labor is measured and paid: time? I did an art piece c 2000, “International currency exchange, a dollar today, tomorrow a dime; yet in international standard time, an hour’s an hour in every clime.” World Average Labor Time is another way of saying Necessary Labor Value.

In re above, I define labor as “bossed time for pay” as opposed to work, which may be the same activity for the same purpose; but work may be unpaid and unbossed. Thence we increasingly labor in order to work.

Sniffle, that was so beautifully choreographed it brings tears of happiness to my eyes. Bwawawahahahahahahaha! And ohhhhhhhhh the laughter. So, let me get this straight Russia, China, and the rest have broken the neo liberal theory and stopped a one world government and eventually one world bank. The same neo liberal policy that killed americas middle class, forced people into low wage jobs, broke up most of the unions, lowered food stamps, made healthcare and insurance unreachable for so many. Censored all journalist that criticized these policies and assassinated all upcoming civil rights leaders and dissidents Now those same oligarchs that did all that plus created a continuous war economy are going to need the same American citizens they have kept their boots on their necks to work and make our own commodities and things. Hmmmmmmmmm just has our labor unions just got a blast of fresh air from Amazon in New York unionizing .Omg, has it turns out these wealthy elites are extremely greedy but not very intelligent from all the inbreeding . Yayyyyyyyyyy! Bwawawahahahahaha. I’m so proud to be an American. Bwawahahahaha.

I’m a bit puzzled that no one, including Ellen, seems to have mentioned the really scary part of the crash of the petrodollar, which is that suddenly all the goods and services which the US imports will become much more expensive, resulting in a form of domestic hyperinflation that the Fed is powerless to quell. It’s one thing if Russia gives up on the dollar, but quite another if the United State’s own citizens do the same!

ellen re: foreign currencies building up when trade is in national currencies…

example might be canadian tire needs to pay for goods produced in china – x yuan ‘going rate’ is x loonies canadian tire deposits x loonies in its ‘foreign exchange trading’ account someone in china needs x loonies and places x yuan in its foreign currency trading account the parties issue the necessary drawing rights – currencies don’t actually ‘leave’ countries will be incentivized to win win trading relationships

Not so. What you don’t realize is that gold, silver and platinum (PMs) have been undercut by the paper market that is the LBMA and COMEX. If you want an accurate understanding of what that is all about, listen to videos by Andrew Macguire and you’ll learn something you obviously don’t know – which is that PMs have been undercut by the paper markets so badly that their value is unbelievably distorted to the point that they should rationally be north of $10K for gold and $500 for silver – per ounce. When this plays out a little further, that is exactly what they will be worth. And to your point that we will spend it, well very few people actually have any bullion. Furthermore, since Fort Knox has never actually been audited, I am very skeptical that the federal government has much either.

In any case, it won’t be long before we all find out the truth. If you think GLD and SLV ETFs are the answer and if Andrew Macguire is correct in his analysis, people who hold that are holding FOOLS gold. The point of precious metals is that they have no counter-party risk. GLD and SLV corporations pedaling this shise are the counter party. They will soon discover the real value of this toilet paper. Wait a minute… It’s not even good for that because it is not clean! Firewood kindling?

Is there a short way you can explain how paper PM trading suppresses physical PM prices? Thanks!

Gold is priced as per its UTILITY value and the real demand for that value added into the real economy. A bubble in the gold price is not permitted for good reason that it would likely destroy the market of a very important monetary metal.

We cannot risk a price bubble , therefore the gold has to earn its price as honest money. This discounts the effect of speculative buying where the bullion would end up moving from one hoard to another with no value added. The short market maintains some semblance of congruence in the market to keep the price of gold in line with real demand.

Gold is money but it can only act as money if the marketplace treats it that way.

Raise the utility value of the gold and the real demand associated and price will follow right on its heels. There is no utility value greater than that of money in support of real economic growth and the associated destruction of over-leveraged debt (inflation)

I’ve trade for more than 40 years and have also made an intense study of debt-free transactions.

” ….. the “American System” of sovereign money and credit. Its three pillars were (a) federal subsidies for internal improvements and to nurture the nation’s fledgling industries, (b) tariffs to protect those industries, and (c) easy credit issued by a national bank.

For some background on “the American System”, Christian Parenti’s “Radical Hamilton” is a good source. Chap 13 refers to Hamilton’s 1791 Report on the Subject of Manufactures in which Hamilton described the “Means proper” for (per author) “government economic action to jump start and assist development of manufacturing” including “protective tariffs, import bans. producer subsidies. export bans on key raw materials ….. and a central bank” among other things. “if Hamilton were ‘the Finance Minister of a developing country today, the IMF and World Bank …. would be lobbying for his removal from office’ (quoting Ha-Joon Chang)”

This was the system that built American manufacturing after the Revolution – and sustained it until large corporations decided it was stunting their growth, and the concept of “protectionism = isolationism” was given a bad rap – the result being dismantling of those measures in the name of “free markets” and the erosion of our industrial base. I would argue that if we want to rebuild that base, we need to go back to that “American System” that built it in the first place – foster self-reliance as a nation as the basis of our domestic policy and help other nations to do the same as a basis for our foreign policy – drop solar panels not bombs …

I agree with this? This would be the perfect opportunity to rebuild a country that actually works for the people as well as the rich and solidify our commitment too the environment which is rapidly making its voice heard across the world. At least it has that potential. And has the past shows when Americans get busy building and creating, we are innovative and can build solid strong built to last products. At least till the companies started putting In cheap parts too intentionally break too make more money. Sigh. I swear greed is a sickness. When I look around the world countries like China, India , copy us.

That’s a nice thought and the door for it was opened almost 50 years ago by the US government but it was ignored by the people. There is no law that requires the elements of the free market to trade with the use of debt (legal tender). What happened ? Did Americans fall asleep, became apathetic of simply didn’t know ?

Michael, Howler]s post was in response to mine re the “American System” – the door may have been opened, again, briefly, 50 years ago, but was first opened in the 1790s – then increasingly closed down starting with the uproar about the Smoot-Hawley tariff, culminating in the 1990s with all those agreements that glorified “free trade”

Your beef seems to be with debt – and i agree, but debt, it seems to me is just a vehicle for guaranteeing endless profits for corp …

I disagree only for practical reasons because there was no market driven gold market with comparable efficiency for the sake of the grass roots. I think your point is valid in spirit. I’m comparing your timing to recent history where gold and currency markets have now technically evolved to the point where we each have real-time transparency and the ability for John Q to participate in real-time transactions, given our digital tools.

Debt-free transactions with the use of real-time price comparisons that are fully consumer driven now take place daily in eCommerce. We on a new threshold where the newfound abilities simply need to be scaled up as a market process, bottom-up. Necessity may be the mother of invention, while intentions may be the father but capability is still the child.

We now make real-time price comparisons for debt-free swaps and before the Executive Order 11825 was written, this real-time horizaon as a functiona of MONETSRY LAW had to be visible.

To Michael, The “grass roots” are rather easily choked out by the weeds, caught in that “transparent” web they couldn’t see through well enough to keep from getting ensnared and – gobbled up

There are no weeds. There is only a reluctant change of habit. That’s why the Fed carries “the stick”. Take the “karat”. See how simple that is ?

To Michael, Karats get cooked …

To Michael, Karats get cooked ..

Good God no ! There is no greater generator of real economic wealth than an economy can can run on a good percentage of debt-free trade. Prove me wrong. The Fed and the government are hugely advantaged on the back of real economic growth, as we all are, where market gold helps to grease the economic wheels. You have trouble with good news ??? The Fed loves karats. They have to come from the grass roots and be applied by the free market, however. This is off limits for the Fed for good reason. The safe introduction can only be market driven from the bottom-up. We price our macro global markets in real-time now. That has to be critically considered. Nobody wants a debt bubble POP that would leave store shelves emptied within a matter of weeks. The debt bubble requires a safe and sane leak, no a deadly POP.

The international banksters that operate outside of governmental control are afraid of losing control. Bank accounts and reserve assets cannot be confiscated unless the banksters agree. Unless somone can give me a good counter argument with evidence, it seems to me that the world is run by economic hit men not elected representatives. The Pentagon and NATO along with the CIA are their mercenaries and minions. How does one enter the “gold market” without dollars that carry interest or a personal gold mine? That gold is a way out, is a fairy tale. If a dime had been invested at 5% interest in year 1 and had been reinvested with compounded interest til now the mass of silver would be more than the total mass of the earth. In other words a metal based currency issued at interest cannot work. The easiest solution is public banking where interest paid replaces taxes and is used for infrastructure and social services and other government functions. In that case fiat currency works fine especially if those in control can be voted out of office.

Not quite sure what you mean, but I agree the dollar is not going away as a major global medium of exchange/measure of value/store of value.

Ellen, I cannot see why the US dollar will have any relevance. At the moment it is merely a convenience. It is not a store of value, as a trip to the gas station will quickly demonstrate. I advised in 2020 that a Central Bank move much of it’s dollar holdings to Yuan and Euro, I believe that they followed that advice. They already were storing Gold and had plans to add as it became available. The Dollar is a useful yardstick, no intrinsic value but useful for calculating how many bricks or tiles one will need. It saves having to calculate 180 exchange rates each day. Can you explain or give a rationale as to why Putin allowed $350 billion to be outside Russia on the day he crossed into Ukraine? My only explanation is that he was willing to sacrifice it to show the other countries how dishonest the USA really is. To prove that nothing is sacred to the US government. That no-one and nothing is safe from them. As for nailing the Oligarchs, the US-EU are doing him a favour. – “In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.”

I suggest you re-examine what the dollar truly is to discover its utility value. There may be an incomplete understanding even if you see it as a debt based medium of exchange created from thin air on the promise to repay…… an IOU. It is so much more and it might be a tremendous benefit for you to know the whole truth and not just a half-truth.

Think of the USD like a segment of sting, a segment that has two distinct and separate ends …. one being the currency (debt), while at the other end, we find the price measure, a value measurement tool of relativity for comparison in the global price model engineered by central banks. It is the price model that now allows and supports debt-free, real-time transactions for consumers in the real economy. These trades cannot be done without this vital price data to compare the price values of two debt-free widgets so that they can trade directly for each other with NO DEBT involved in the transaction. ZERO. Barter , in spirit ! Does a measure of gold trading for a new suit come to mind ? 🙂 Did you think the dollar only had practical use as a currency (debt) ? Think twice about that. We were fooled for quite a while ! The stage had to be set according to our progressive monetary journey. The door is now wide open to trade debt-free.

Educate and inform the whole mass of the people. They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty – Thomas Jefferson

Beautiful and well written truth and insight Ellen. It goes along also with a prophecy I received about Putin that he is taking on the mantle of Czar Nicolas 1 & 2 in standing against the bankers.

I will share this with LT at andweknow.com

Don’t know but mine do too, and I’m the author. It’s not my blog. 🙂

I think the world financial system is way too complex to predict its future behavior.

Took me awhile to get through the main post and its links plus all the comments. Well worth the time! Thanks, all of you.

As an old blue collar worker for whom econspeak is a very foreign language, I do my best to keep up. Including corresponding w/ alt. economists and professors of monetary theory over the years. It still amazes me how much of this is a psychology of beliefs. As long as the major players act as if the econ system and/or parts thereof are true, it lurches along.

The market. Yes, I get what that symbolizes. Yet I’ve long suspected it’s a case of what Alfred North Whitehead was referring to by “the fallacy of misplaced concreteness.”

Faith is powerful. There is a force said to rule all else. Its stern laws are interpreted for us by mostly older white men who urge obedience. Since few of us commoners can read its sacred texts, we take their word for it, fearing the punishment often meted out if we challenge authority.

The idea that gold or any other item is valuable rests on collective belief. Just before the 1999 WTO meeting that became, I’m proud to say, known as “the Battle of Seattle,”there was a series of lectures and teach-ins at the U. of WA. One by a prof. of biz econ. who explained how The Market, if its self-correcting functions were not interfered with, would solve ecological problems. His example was that in a desert, water would be more valuable than diamonds, therefore water would be conserved. At the Q & A afterwards, I asked: “But doesn’t that require conditions deteriorate to those of a desert before it would work?” He turned beet red and told me I didn’t know what I was talking about.

On the ferry ride home, David Korten said: “I suspect that at some level such economists are aware their theories are bunk. Understandable that they would be sensitive to people pointing that out. Puncture the bubble and they have nothing.” Of course their hot air is well protected by thousands of local and federal laws and by international treaties. Plus by heavily armed military forces.

Seems we have a blind date with destiny and she’s already ordered the beluga caviar.

Rafi, Whitehead’s Fallacy of Misplaced Concreteness – Yes! I seldom, if ever, see anyone else refer to this – it is a favorite of mine – all incomplete models (and they are all incomplete) fail when confronted with – real life ….

Damned it I didn’t just present this exact same thesis on my friends’ show Post-Orthodoxy this very day! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNn8q2tqsEk

Terrific “un-embedded” pro-people take on how things are shifting. I like your views and celebrate all the constructive comments 🙂 You go girl 🙂

these blunders are characteristic of empires in decline…as many have observed the US political system is designed to be paralyzed and there is nearly no true left wing movement that can influence policy no matter which ruling class political party prevails

Ellen Brown, sheltered pampered entitled materially and financially privileged cis gen het white “Boomer” woman and her continuing crusade of genocide on the MAJORITY lower 4 quintiles of wealth and income households.

Would you care to explain “… her continuing crusade of genocide on the MAJORITY lower 4 quintiles of wealth and income households. ” Where and when did she crusade for genocide? In all the reading of her books and articles, I have seen her “crusade” as a wishing that others will become aware of the machinations of the top 1%-2%. Such an awareness would uplift and improve the lower 4 quintiles wealth rather than damage them.

PJ London, spoken like a true member of the 19% who follow the top 1% , the professional managerial class who facilitate the wealth extraction from those of US, the MAJORITY, in the lower 4 quintiles for that 1 to 2%. And, are you really THAT literal?

Ellen, isn’t the massive federal debt of the US just a result of its financial system ie. the US govt. BORROWS the money from its own private banks and NOT in any way related to whether or not the USD is a reserve currency (with its link to Oil)….

The USD is the reserve fiat currency with its link to gold too. The gold can also be its symbiotic partner with its symbiotic link to the USD price tool.

Can you think of any advantages as to why the dollar should maintain the price link to oil when considering the following ???

Oil is a commodity that is consumed and essentially goes up in smoke.

Gold bullion can now be used with a digital mass based proxy (debt-free currency) where the flow doesn’t go up in smoke but goes round and round and round and round, while greasing the wheels of debt-free trade. Where is the greater potential for the health and strength of the economy and the USD price tool ?

Bye-bye petrodollar ….. hello 21st cenrly fishes and loaves.

Great article, Ellen! I was going to write you to point out you had missed the crucial history related to the neocon ‘Project for a New American Century’ (PNAC) scheme, which General Wesley Clark famously detailed in various presentations 20 years ago – i.e., the plan to invade 7 energy exporting nations in 3 years. But then, with your final sentence, you finally made an oblique reference to what I call plan A: “But it could well mean the end of the petrodollar as sole global reserve currency, and the end of the devastating petroleum wars it has funded to maintain its dominance.”

Yes! Maintaining the ‘value’ of the ‘US’ dollar (which does not belong to us or the US) was precisely the point of those illegal invasions predicated on a ‘new Peal harbor’ false flag terrorist attack. It was evident several years ago that the PNAC plan A had failed, and that mean the petrodollar system was also doomed to fail. One of the primary (yet generally unrecognized) purposes of that plan to seize control of those energy exporting nations was to control WHICH CURRENCY was demanded in payment for exports on the global market.

In other words, controlling those nations was meant to maintain the only remaining prop supporting the perceived ‘value’ of a privately owned, debt based currency created from thin air. Russia’s latest move tying the ruble to gold was the official death knell of the petrodollar.

and as an ignorant cuss, the Trans Pacific Partnership was going rope all of those countries into the dollar as well

Thank you for this great article about the history and the various current events.

1 – I believe by “Omar Qaddafi” you mean Muammar Qaddafi

2 – You state that Qaddafi and Saddam Hussein were assassinated – not strictly accurate. Qaddaffi, while fleeing NATO attacks, was killed during arrest by local Libyan rebel militia during an ongoing civil war. Certainly this could be considered extrajudicial execution. Hussein, on the other hand, was executed after trial and conviction by Iraqi courts. The trial was flawed, but his role in the crimes against humanity committed in the 1980s was nevertheless clear and a fairer trial would likely have still found him guilty.

Qaddafi was assassinated by mercenary militia in the pay and under the command of French agents. You may wish to ask yourself ‘Who set him up with safe conduct guarantees for his convoy and then tipped off the French to attack him?’ Nothing was a trial in the Hussein case. There was no reference to any activities prior to the invasion of Kuwait which was orchestrated and given approval by the USA. Kuwaitis, even those harmed by the invasion do not hate the Iraqis or Saddam but spit on all things American. There were NO ‘war crimes’. The USA was in constant communication and provided advisors at general staff level down to operational level. USA wanted to gain control of the Northern Iranian oil fields and used Hussein as it’s proxy.Nor could they charge him with any domestic crimes, especially as he had pardoned many more criminals than he had continued their court sentences. He was murdered. It was a Kangaroo court of the very worst kind had you bothered to watch the proceedings. No discovery, no defence permitted.

We will never be free as long as money is what our susutainability and survival revolve around and are totally dependent on. In many ways money is more debilitating than any other aspect of human life. Money can be equated with greed, but never freedom.

That’s a good perception of debt based money but what of the other form of money that is legal , lawful and fully market driven without the use of debt ?

I’ve read all your comments on this article and don’t understand what you’re promoting. Can you clearly explain your theory and from where it drives? Please provide links if possible.

Gold and silver have both been market monetized as circulating medium and are now transacting in support of debt-free trade within the world of eCommerce. The current debt based model isn’t flawed as much as it’s incomplete, much like a “Yin” that has no “Yang”, no balance and no symbiosis. It’s incumbent on the free market and the free market, only, to close the loop by monetizing and spending its own sovereign money in addition to our current “debt dealing” habits. None of this could really come to fruition without the advent of real-time pricing and the appropriate technology to support real-time transactions. This is not theory. These trades have begun. We only need to scale them up as a market driven process now.

Can you even imagine riding a bicycle designed for two wheels with only one wheel assembled onto the frame ? Tough go ! That’s what we’ve been doing, James. What to do now ?

Thank-you for discussing the US Dollar as the world’s reserve currency and its future.

I think it’s fair to look at a nation’s currency much like the stock of a company: while standards and measures are used to valuate a stock, holding it is still an act of faith and this is true for a currency. I have long heard how important it is for Canada and the US to balance their budgets and avoid a deficit, but this is misleading: the gov’t creates a currency, and can create the entire federal budget if it wanted, as well as erase its debt. After all, we’re talking about lines on a page. In fairness, there would be a strong reaction from Wall Street to such an approach, as the Dollar, which is openly traded, would be damaged. The issue is one of ideology, and perception (on which value for any commodity is based), rather than a technical problem.

Further, the technical language of finance, makes it difficult for a layman to understand, when in fact much of the way the stock market and Federal Reserve operates, can be argued is a type of giant ponzi scheme. The gov’t can “create” money via banks as loans or treasury bills, but then owes interest on the money it itself creates! Then, more than half of discretionary (federal budget minus social spending) goes to military and espionage agencies, while bridges and utilities like water are neglected, and people live without housing, higher education or healthcare.

Michael Hudson has stated that the US is destroying its own status as the reserve currency by its sanctions and tactics against other countries. The US has abused its privilege to exploit and impoverish much of the world to benefit its own upper class. I will not be sorry to hear the end of 800 military bases and military activity in almost all countries of the world, which having reserve currency status has allowed the US to do. Any other country would be heavily punished for a massive trade deficit (weak industrial economy) while spending beyond its means on the military.

Wouldn’t the immediate upshot of USD falling from reserve currency grace be that US military spending at the levels we’ve seen will come to a screeching halt?

Yes along with the whole economy… LOL

Depends. For goods and services produced wholly within the US, USD should work as a fiat currency. For imports, on the other hand, imports would be bounded by exports and any sustained trade deficits would probably devalue the currency and inflate prices.

Small price to pay to end the reign of terror of the US empire in the global south.

Impossible. Debt, if left to itself is doomed. It’s like a Yin with no Yang, no sense of balance and no symbiosis. It cannot survive based on the laws of a free economy that wishes to maintain market balancing and market driven price discovery.

Can you imagine riding a bicycle designed for two wheels with only one wheel assembled onto the frame ?

We need some “monetary Yang” with our “Yin”, whereby the economy can grow in the REAL sense while price discovery sets in as debt is safely purged and retired. This cannot take place on the back of debt and debt alone. Debt-free market based medium must added into circulation in order to arrive here. The monetary model is not so much flawed at the moment as it is incomplete.

Subsidize job guarantees or societal benefits? Good lord, however am I to submit and be convinced to impose totalitarian ideologies on myself? Protect me, dearest overlords. You know best what fundamentally centered things people want. A livable and sustainable environment, education, healthcare, shelter, healthy food, non nuclear brinkmanship, each are out of the question as none of them frightens, distracts nor divides us enough to do your, oh so gracious bidding. I yield to the wellbeing my elite betters dole out.

Let’s do our part to uncouple the US from our dependency on the Chinese supply chain.

Visit http://www.reservecurrency.co

The government already gave the free market an open door ? The US has the greatest untapped export ever devised by mankind.

Very informative! I knew about 50% of your content but this filled in many blank spaces. I thought that losing reserve currency status would devastate the value of the U.S. dollar & be a hardship in the U.S. as it was for Great Britain in 1944. However, it is logical that, with a reduction in the value of the U.S. dollar, goods would be more expensive to import & production would increase in the U.S. over the log term. Short term, it will be negative to the U.S. economy. Please correct any assumptions I have made!!!

What Michael Hudson points out clearly in ‘Super Imperialism…” is the dollar reserve currency has allowed the United States to fund its deficits, which he claims are primarily military, on the back of the rest of the world. Ironically, once that goes, the US military will necessarily have to reduce in material, men, and scope. It will no longer be able to support the mission of defending the dollar.

The free market can defend (and enhance) the dollar and do it far more efficiently by using the USD global price tool with gold based payments in support of real economic growth and the safe and sane purging of inflationary debt. Rates rise easily on the back of real economic growth. Nothing new there.

Why fight wars for the sake of a debt instrument when you can support peace and prosperity by using the USD price tool that formed on the “other end” ? When you fully understand the value of the dollar, you realize that it’s just like a segment of string with two very distinct “ends”, meaning two very distinct utilities. The fiat currency (debt) only resides at one “end” while the price tools that the marketplace creates and uses reside at the “other end”.

It’s the price tool that now supports real-time debt free transactions in eCommerce. These now occur daily and require scaling up. Market driven. Bye-bye petrodollar, hello 21st century fishes and loaves when the free market cares enough about its economy that it gives the dollar a kick-ass promotion ! Why measure the value of oil that goes up in smoke when the flow of gold can go round and round and round and round and round …etc…etc…etc ?

bizzarre amerikan theology–“free market”…freedom in usa is choice between coke and Pepsi

…. and your legal and lawful ability to trade with the use of your own sovereign gold. You forget that George, you and hundreds of millions of Americans. It’s protected and has been protected since Executive Order 11825, going back to Dec 31, 1974. Note the timing was about 2 1/2 years after the fixed price peg had been dissolved in the price model, allowing the market to govern the price of gold. A precious metal that’s limited and finite cannot be monetized and used efficiently, long term, if the price of the bullion is fixed and pegged by fiat. Its the law of supply and demand and corresponding prices that speaks on that point.

Americans fell asleep or were just plain apathetic or totally missed the significance. Which do you think ? That monetary door is still wide open and people are beginning to respond.

https://www.usgoldbureau.com/gold-confiscation

To Michael, I am sooo relieved to know that I have the freedom to choose between Coke and Pepsi with my own sovereign gold! What a relief! Of course if happen to want orange juice – guess I’m screwed

One leads to the other. What’s in your wallet ? Debt-free trade does wonderful things for real economic growth.

To George, Especially in our political choices – we are allowed to hear from artificially sweetened Coke and Pepsi, but not from organic orange juice …

Here, more Rabbi-induced writers of the fascist kind, Kaplan, Bloomberg. This is what these people believe: Multimillionaires.

Putin, with his project of pitiless imperialism, has little in common with the relatively enlightened autocrats of Morocco, Jordan and Oman — who, by the way, are all U.S. allies. The fact that nondemocratic systems have been so widespread (and growing in number) is not because evil rules the world, but because in many places circumstances are simply not ripe for stable democracy.

These well-healed fascists of the Eastern Seaboard Variety are Enemies of the People:

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-04-01/russia-ukraine-war-to-save-global-democracy-sign-up-a-few-good-dictators

Here is a monkey wrench I would like to throw in the mix – Keep in mind the Banking Cartel has been in play for eons and as the host said in the link provided below, the only way to end all of this money/currency/defacto petro dollar chaos mess is to annihilate the below named –

Keep in mind all the world wars and consequences, 9/11 and recent events inclusive of election fraud, covid lunacy, big pharma experimental vaxx jabs, and now the h.buyden laptop – ukraine and russia and anything else the deep state cabal swamp khazarian mafia criminal consortium lodged in every country on this planet conjures up – is interlocked, interconnected, webbed and works in tandem with their currency they created which was kickstarted before most of us were dropped out of the womb.

Then add into the mix The Act of 1871, the Knights of Templar, Freemason and any other cult consortium existing on Planet Earth.

And until the inherently good of Humanity wake the flock up and stop supporting by being in denial that all this is somehow not connected; Humanity will forever exist on this merry go round of insanity analyzing and talking about gold, silver, precious metals and stock market like it’s our best friend when large swaths of common folk Human Beings don’t even have access to any of the purchasing list noted above because for most it’s unobtainable.

The only way out is to implode the whole system of criminal cartels on all levels and disburse all the buried hidden treasures/currencies/assets from all the [dumbs-deep underground military base] tunnels, vatican, queen chambers, etc and disburse it to the good of Humanity to start fresh. Revert back to Common Law – 1776 and ideology from Abraham Lincoln and all his kin known as the Kennedy’s along with the Real Potus DJT who is also kin. – do your own research but dig deep because this is how far the covid lunacy cover up rabbit hole goes –

[copy and paste either title [same content] into your URL to view] – Keep with this one – very enlightening & very informative and explains the [two side of the same coin]

Ukraine War_ Made in Switzerland (bitchute.com) [52:12]

https://www.bitchute.com/video/U6pLzojScBL8/?list=notifications&randomize=false [52:12] – The Suisse Secrets banking scandal of 2022 got announced on February 20th, and only 4 days later on February 24th the SwiSS banking client President Putin started the senseless Ukraine war in order to silence up the biggest banking scandal, the world has ever seen. Mission Accomplished: now everyone, all politricksters and all media liars only talk about the Ukraine War with the Suisse Secrets scandal being completely forgotten as being entirely non existent. Thus Putin and the rest of the Swiss WEF gangsters have the time to transfer the money from the SwiSS Credit Suisse Bank to a safer place. The scandal involves more than 30.000 criminal bank clients with more than 100 Billion Dollars of criminal money in assets. Small innocent defenceless Ukrainian children have to be butchered and sacrificed, so the SwiSSies can make their money! The Ukraine War shows the true essence of corporotism intertwined with the military industrial complex in a criminal setup and conflict of interest dripping down from it, like the saliva of the hungry SwiSS Beast dripping down on the base of the Whore of Babylon in the Alps, who’s riding the Beast. And all Nations of the earth have traded with the Whore of Babylon in the Alps; all dictators, all criminals and Aristocrats have their money in those dirty SwiSS Nazi-Templar Banks and are all trading with The Swiss Beast – Home of the Devil.

Interesting speculative text, if somewhat both premature, and mired with misrepresentations, omissions and inaccuracies.

The rise of the Petrodollar was a result of (or in the least prompt by) the US central leadership role in the victory against Nazi Germany. It was a manifestation of victory, unity and (projected) peace. Putin’s move is a desperate attempt to counter a (justified, diplomatic) unified global move to clarify to Russia that its aggressive and unprovoked militarized imperialism in Ukraine is unacceptable. In other words, Putin’s is a destructive instrument of war that exposes the Russian willingness to blackmail its clients, and would forever be branded in that negative light, while the Petrodollar was instrumental in the renewal of Europe after the devastation of WW II.

This left-ish Neo Progressive tendency to strip events from their context permeates not just the text above, but seem to be a permanent feature in their narrative. And so, like the polaric contexts of the rise of the petrodollars and Putin’s move, the ouster of Mubarak and Qaddafi, as well as NATO bombardment of Libya, are striped from their Arab Spring and the murderous response of the two Arab leaders to it from their actual causal context, and henceforth can be assigned any narrative-serving context.

The Russian war on Ukraine is about independence, sovereignty, diplomacy and political rights from the Ukrainian side, and militarism, imperialism and fascistic conservatism from the Russian one. While the attraction of alternative explanations to the disaster unfolding in Ukraine is understandable, even expected from people whose commitment to anti-liberalism surpasses anything else, the flirt of left-ish Neo Progressives with propaganda demagoguery is both dangerous and inexcusable, since it stripes it from its most important distinctive feature, namely uncompromisable commitment to facts, in their entirety.

Just more big jowled blubbering — Democracy Gone Astray? When would that be? THe leadership of Ukraine, the bombers of Ukraine, the Nazi’s of Ukraine, the Propagandists of Ukraine, the ZioLenskyy Chancey Gardner, Being THere Nazie enabler of Ukraine? Right.

Good work, Ellen, and Pepe Escobar, and Michael Hudson and Graham Phillips, and . . . .

https://sputniknews.com/20220408/dutch-journo-we-are-here-in-donbass-to-awaken-westerners-deluded-by-msm-propaganda-1094596416.html

https://youtu.be/LDcbxO8uGA4

Russia has triumphed—culturally, economically, militarily…as ukraine is denazified—hillbilly fascists become more traumatized

It is said that nothing can last forever and things that can’t last forever don’t.

The Collective West has blown off both of its financial feet with the Russian sanctions. It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of tyrants. That tatty piece of cotton that is the US dollar is finally on the slippery slope to oblivion and maybe, although it is far from guaranteed we may be better off for this.

… only true if one is blind to the mission of the USD supporting debt-free trade as a real-time price tool. That’s value that supports real economic growth. These trades take place daily now. There’s an elephant in the room that you’ve missed.

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