Contents

 
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… without subtitles (condensed version)

Preface

Introduction

Part I: Terms, Parameters and Functions Concerning Money
Chapter 1: Review of Money-Related Terms and Processes
Chapter 2: Money and Credit
Chapter 3: Money in Circulation – Money Cycle
Chapter 4: Commercial Banks, Central Banks and Non-banks

Part II: Interest and Other Erroneous Structures
Chapter 5: Interest in the Past and at Present
Chapter 6: The Effects of Interest and Compound Interest
Chapter 7: Interest as a Means of Redistribution
Chapter 8: Inflation and Deflation
Chapter 9: The Problem of Money Hoarding
Chapter 10: The Dilemma of Controlling the Money Supply and Money Circulation
Chapter 11: Creation and Supply of Money through Issuing Banks
Chapter 12: Money Creation by Commercial Banks

Part III: Problematical Consequences for Money
Chapter 13: The Excessive Growth of Debt
Chapter 14: National Indebtedness
Chapter 15: Corporate Debt, Private Debt, Overcoming Debt
Chapter 16: Excess Growth of Monetary Assets
Chapter 17: The Excess Growth of Interest Flows
Chapter 18: The Scale of Interest in the Corporate Sector
Chapter 19: Interest Burdens and Interest Revenues of Private Households
Chapter 20: Excess Speculation

Part IV: Social and Economic Effects
Chapter 21: Money and Justice – the Social Issue
Chapter 22: The Consequences of Interest-Based Income
Chapter 23: Money, Growth, Environment – the Ecological Consequences
Chapter 24: The Causes of Our Growth Imperative
Chapter 25: Money and Crises – the Economic Consequences
Chapter 26: Crises in Planned Economies
Chapter 27: The Problem of Unemployment
Chapter 28: Unemployment at Declining Interest Rates
Chapter 29: Market Economy – Capitalism – Globalisation
Chapter 30: Money, War and the Destruction of Capital
Chapter 31: The War Against the Third World and Against Ourselves

Part V: Overcoming Dysfunctional Structures
Towards a Market Economy Free from Crises
Chapter 32: From Symptoms to Corrections
Chapter 33: The Effects of the Corrections
Chapter 34: Various Thoughts about and Objections to Money Reform
Chapter 35: Local Exchange Trading Systems and Other Alternatives
Chapter 36: A Concluding Summary

APPENDIX: Bibliography, Register, Subject Index

… with subtitles (full version)

Preface

Introduction
What is wrong with our money? – What is the importance of money?

Part I
Terms, Parameters and Functions Concerning Money

Chapter 1
Review of Money-Related Terms and Processes
What is money? – What is considered to be money today? – Are cheques, credit cards and cash cards money? – What about e-cash or payments via the Internet? – What about the money supply? – How can money be defined? – For what purposes can money be used? – Why do we have to differentiate between money and other means of claim settlements? – Why is money superior to labour and goods? – From where does money get its value? – How much money actually exists? – What does the cash supply as regards the Euro look like? – What are the orders of magnitude in money calculations? – How does money come into circulation? – What are the advantages of monetary targeting through credits? – From where do the issuing banks get the money? – To whom does money belong?

Chapter 2
Money and Credit
What are assets and how do they grow? – Why can money and credit balances not both be considered as money? – Can money and deposits still be grouped together? – What are demand deposits and how do they come into existence? – How do transfers from one account to another get executed? – Can one increase his demand with demand funds? – What are the consequences of an increase in credit transfers for the banks? – What came first – assets or debts, money or credit? – How great is the difference between cash supply and bank credits? – What do savings and payment mean?

Chapter 3
Money in Circulation – Money Cycle
The enigmatic 5-Mark coin – What is meant by a cycle? – What sort of consequences can savings have? – What can be learnt from these island examples? – What is the effect of interest claims in detail? – Does the cycle change in a larger model?

Chapter 4
Commercial Banks, Central Banks and Non-banks
Relationships and orders of magnitude in money and banking fields – What are the main tasks of banks? – What about the power of banks? – Do power and influence of banks grow with their turnover? – What are the tasks of central – or issuing – banks? – What does “securing the currency” mean? – How do the central banks regulate the money in circulation and why is this function so important? – What does “regulates … the supplying of credit to the economy” mean? – Credits to banks – how does that work? – What about the minimum reserve? – When do the issuing banks have to increase the money supply? How can they do that? – What about the ‘monetary targeting’ of issuing banks? – Which “money supply” are the issuing banks attempting to control? – From where do the profits for the issuing banks come?

Part II
Interest and Other Erroneous Structures

Chapter 5
Interest in the Past and at Present
Why is interest a problem? – What actually is interest? – What function does interest have? – Have there ever been periods without interest? – What was the effect of the “Bracteates”? – What is interest today? – How is interest categorised at present? – How is interest composed? – What does the bank margin of interest rates encompass? – What does base rate mean? – What influence do the issuing banks have on the market interest? – What are the scale of and relationship between bank interest revenues and interest expenses?

Chapter 6
The Effects of Interest and Compound Interest
Where does interest actually come from? – To what extent is interest hidden in prices? – Is interest a monopoly income? – What effect does compound interest have? – Does compound interest play any role in normal time frames? – Is a twelve per cent interest rate unrealistic? – Who or what determines the interest level? – Who or what determines the interest level? – Can interest rates be kept high only by making money scarce?

Chapter 7
Interest as a Means of Redistribution
How is interest collected? – Who receives interest payments? – What is the effect of interest in the distribution of the national income? – What role does the interest rate play during redistribution? – What changes the distribution coefficient? – Do interests raise the level of the gross national product? – What about tax on interest? – Why is the adage “Time is Money” correct? – Does interest alter the nature of money? – Is there a just interest system?

Chapter 8
Inflation and Deflation
Is the necessity of stable money an insight of our times? – What does inflation mean and what is its effect? – Is a stable currency really so important? – Inflation in industrialized nations – The consequences of inflations – Can inflation be called fraud? – Can consumers also trigger inflation? – Do increases in individual prices influence inflation? – What about wage rises in this context? – Can inflation rates be balanced by wage adjustments? – What are the effects of increased interest rates during inflation? – What about deflation?

Chapter 9
The Problem of Money Hoarding
Is money still hoarded today and what kinds of hoardings have to be distinguished? – What is the extent of hoarding in foreign countries and what are the consequences? – What kinds of hoardings are particularly critical? – How large are the increases in hoardings due to low interest rates? – What are the consequences of money hoarding today? – Can these fluctuations in hoarding money be verified for long terms, too?

Chapter 10
The Dilemma of Controlling the Money Supply and Money Circulation
Why is money circulation so important? – How do the issuing banks go about regulating the money supply? – What is the outcome of these efforts at stabilisation? – What is the biggest dilemma of the issuing banks? – Can the issuing banks limit the money supply? – The bitter lessons of the issuing banks

Chapter 11
Creation and Supply of Money through Issuing Banks
How is the economy funded with money? – The liquidity control by the European Central Bank (ECB) – What does tender rate mean? – Why do the banks need central bank money?

Chapter 12
Money Creation by Commercial Banks
What about theories? – How does ‘multiple money creation’ work? – Where is the error in reasoning? – What other arguments are still being put forward in favour of money creation? – Is there an evidence for money creation by banks?

Part III
Problematical Consequences for Money

Chapter 13
The Excessive Growth of Debt
Who are the debtors in industrial nations? – Does this individual example reflect reality?

Chapter 14
National Indebtedness
National indebtedness in Germany – Why do national debts have particularly serious consequences? – What about the states’ indebtedness of other industrial nations? – … And in the Euro nations? – How do such huge debts come about at all?

Chapter 15
Corporate Debt, Private Debt, Overcoming Debt
Consumer debts – a credit with a future? – What are the consequences of buying on credit? – Can over-indebtedness be overcome? – Would the debts be reduced through insolvencies? – Can the debt problem be solved through repayment?

Chapter 16
Excess Growth of Monetary Assets
What are monetary assets made up of? – To whom do monetary assets belong? – How did the shares of the sectors change? – How are private monetary assets distributed? – Are there indicators for the distribution of private monetary wealth? – What can be concluded from the random samples? – What does the worldwide wealth distribution look like? – How are monetary assets created and where does the excessive growth come from? – What does science say about the over-development of monetary assets?

Chapter 17
The Excess Growth of Interest Flows
How do interest-flows change in macro-economy? – What does the divergent development look like in the long term? – The money-related interest of the state – What does the situation in other countries look like? – What if the state asked citizens directly for the repayment of its debts?

Chapter 18
The Scale of Interest in the Corporate Sector
How does the increase in interest rates affect the house building industry? – What about the total interest burden? – How large is the total of interest-bearing assets? – Can the interest burden be estimated by other means? – What is the share of the interest charges in individual prices?

Chapter 19
Interest Burdens and Interest Revenues of Private Households
What about direct interest? – How large are the interest revenues of private households and how are they distributed? – What are the lowest and what the highest incomes from interest? – From where does Miss Quandt get 650,000 DM daily?

Chapter 20
Excess Speculation
How do the banks behave? – What are the consequences of stock speculation? – How large are the stocks of shares in the world and how are they distributed? – What does the per capita distribution of shares look like? – What is the reality in distribution? – Which parameters determine what happens at the stock exchange? – Stock speculation and the real economy – Can prices fluctuate? – Are there also localised slumps in prices? – Derivatives and other types of speculation – The problem of currency exchange rate speculation – What are the consequences of currency speculation? – Consequences – Should the scope of allowed capital transactions be limited?

Part IV
Social and Economic Effects

Chapter 21
Money and Justice – the Social Issue
When are incomes unjust? – What kind of injustice arises from inflation? – To what sort of injustices does interest lead? – How are assets distributed? – How can the extent of interest flows be determined? – What is the result of balancing?

Chapter 22
The Consequences of Interest-Based Income Redistribution
The background to the ‘new poverty’ – Can there be poverty without wealth? – How does poverty vary in Europe? – How does the inter-relationship between the poor and the rich come about? – When did the discrepancy set in? – What are the consequences of a further widening of the poverty-wealth gap? – Does any other corroborative evidence about these discrepancies exist?

Chapter 23
Money, Growth, Environment – the Ecological Consequences
What growth rules are to be observed? – Are there different growth processes? – How unreal is exponential growth? – What about differential growth within an organism? – What does economic growth mean? – How was economic growth actually increased since 1950? – Why did continuous economic growth come about? – What else was done to achieve steadily increasing growth?

Chapter 24
The Causes of Our Growth Imperative
Why is a capitalist economic system compelled to grow? – Why does interest require growth? – What do the actual interactions look like? – What consequences does continuous economic growth have for the environment? – Is growth possible without any impact on the environment? – What sort of dubious activities have emerged from state-sponsored growth up to now? – Can environment-related problems be solved through eco-taxes?

Chapter 25
Money and Crises – the Economic Consequences
What have been the big crises of the last century? – What else could lead to a big crisis in our time? – Is capitalism itself the cause of the crises? – How are the continuing setbacks in the economic situation to be explained? – What are the causes of economic slumps? – Is the interconnection between interest rates and economic activity generally known? – Why do low interest rates also trigger crises? – What sets off the deflationary crises? – What sorts of effects does the withholding of money have?

Chapter 26
Crises in Planned Economies
Did the crises in the Eastern Bloc also have something to do with money? – What are the tangible consequences of a money surplus? – Was socialism aware of the money problem? – What happened in Yugoslavia? – What role did interest play in the countries of the former Eastern Bloc? – Are there yet other problems in the East that are connected with money? – What should be done today? – How did the unification of East and West Germany affect money?

Chapter 27
The Problem of Unemployment
What are the reasons for long-term changes? – Are there other reasons for the long-term increase in unemployment? – The reasons for the medium-term spurts in the growth of unemployment – What role does indebtedness play? – Are there lay-offs only in indebted companies? – What are the consequences of these discrepancies? – What are the reasons for high interest phases?

Chapter 28
Unemployment at Declining Interest Rates
How is the increase in basic unemployment to be explained? – How does the interest burden change in relation to the national product? – Do the effects of changes in the interest rates apply to other countries too? – What action does the state take in times of employment crises?

Chapter 29
Market Economy – Capitalism – Globalisation
What exactly is meant by market economy? – What is meant by capitalism? – What does globalisation mean? – What about liberalization and deregulation? – What about provision for old age?

Chapter 30
Money, War and the Destruction of Capital
Does war really have anything to do with interest? – Have the destructions of the Second World War lasted sufficiently long enough? – The madness of overkill – Do armaments only service capital? – Does shortage of capital and its destruction actually happen? – How was it during the first Gulf War? – And what did the second Gulf War bring? – Why actually no arms conversion?

Chapter 31
The War Against the Third World and Against Ourselves
Did the developing nations also preserve us from going through purification crises? – How did the developing countries become indebted? – What consequences did the level of debts have? – Is debt relief the right way out? – What should take the place of debt relief? – What consequences would declining interest rates have?

Part V
Overcoming Dysfunctional Structures
Towards a Market Economy Free from Crises

Chapter 32
From Symptoms to Corrections
Where do the changes have to start from? – What characterizes public facilities? – What is the consequence of the present legal position? – Why does our money need to be passed on? – What does circulation safeguarding of money mean? – Why is an effective circulation safeguard necessary? – Does a constructive circulation safeguard have an effect on the ‘money strike’? – Examples of interest-independent circulation safeguards – from the Bracteates to Wörgl – What do demand potential and credit potential mean? – What other effects do changes in payment habits have? – Who can rectify the legal status of money?

Chapter 33
The Effects of the Corrections
What is the effect of the retention fee? – What would be the specific consequences of the separation of demand and credit potentials for the issuing banks? – What are the changes for the commercial banks? – How do interest rates change after the money reform? – How could money be made to move on? – What are the practical options available for cash? – What do the economists have to say about the question of circulation safeguarding? – What do economists, bankers and politicians of today have to say about the reform proposals? – Can one country alone begin with monetary reforms?

Chapter 34
Various Thoughts about and Objections to Money Reform
Does man have to change? – Will speculation be checked with money reform? – Is a flight into gold and other material assets to be anticipated? – Will there be flight into real estate? – What has to be done with regard to land? – What about capital flight with declining interest rates? – Does circulation safeguarding lead to a growth-euphoria? – Is the Euro a solution? – Are the maintenance costs of money and inflation comparable?

Chapter 35
Local Exchange Trading Systems and Other Alternatives
How does the local exchange trading system (LETS) function? – Can money be put into circulation through local exchange trading rings? – The WIR-Wirtschaftsring (economic circle) in Switzerland – What about interest in accounting rings and other alternative models? – What about alternative money systems? – Can alternative banking systems be of any help? – What about environmental and ethical funds?

Chapter 36
A Concluding Summary
Why do we go off the rails? – Where is the lever to be positioned?

APPENDIX

Bibliography
Register
Subject Index

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