Description

Trade Fallacies by Arthur Kitson published 1917
pg 19 - If through a stoppage of our paper mills we were to run short of railway tickets, theater tickets and postage stamps, no on would consider this a valid reason why the authorities should suspend our railway and postal services, and close our theaters. Substitutes for tickets and stamps would soon be furnished, and the traffic, preformaces, and services would proceed as usual. So it is with the money supply. Some of the greatest wars in history have been fought and won by nations who, from the financiers' standpoint, were hopelessly bankrupt. napoleon and the French Republic fought Europe with nothing more solid in the financial line than "paper bullets". Great Britain fought and conquered Napoleon with the aid of similar financial weapons. The American War of Independence and their Civil War were both similarly financed.

pg 29 - Financing a world-wide crisis like the present, by the method of the loan, means inevitable enslavement of this and future generations. It inflicts a perpetual burden upon production! It constitutes a wedge which separates society into the two eternally confliction classes: the idle rich, who live on interest ; and the over-burdened poor, who must produce it. Its effects are disastrous both socially and economically.

pg 33 - The generosity of the Government saved the banks, as usual, at the public expense. The entire credit of the nation was placed at the banks' disposal which enabled them to open their doors, resume business, and avoid receivership. The nation was compelled by a complacent Chancellor to take all the risks whilst the bankers took all the profits. if at that time the Government had siezed the golden opportunity of nationalizing our entire banking business, instead of catering to the private interests of bank shareholders, they could have effected one of the greatest and most valuable achievements of modern times, and gained the nation incalculable advantages

pg 64 - To an outsider who for the first time learns the true nature of banking, it will appear amazing that intelligent men should devise a system so inherently weak and seriously regard it as a basis for a great nation's trade and industry!

PG 128 - the MONOPOLY OF MONEY IS THE GREATEST OF ALL MONOPOLIES, FOR IT CONTROLS all others! It gives its controllers supreme power over production, trade and commerce-nay over life itself! Under modern conditions money has been made indispensable to every one.

pg 130 - A system which discriminates against production of wealth in in favor gambling pure and simple, is neither morally nor economically beneficial to any country.

pg 147 - Neither gold nor silver bullets have ever proved so effective as paper bullets.

pg 149 ...banking is a highly protected guild constituting a private legalized monopoly.

pg 167 - The truth is that for our home trade, gold is entirely unnecessary... Our manufacturing and commercial interests demand a currency that can be relied upon, which will stay at home and not travel abroad and can be obtained when it is needed. The demand a uniform bank rate and not one that is constantly oscillating like a pump handle.

pg 201 - ...They then placed the whole science in a water-tight compartment, so that it had no possible connexion or relation with any other science.Both Ethics and psychology were deliberately ignored...

pg 221 - Many modern writers point to the fact that both from the moral and economic standpoints the policy of laissez-faire has been a dismal failure...