[ExI] Bank of England

[Stefano Vaj]

On Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 9:15 PM, Dan<dan_ust at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Yes, but the problem with that is most people won't organize for that sort of thing unless conditions are not only really bad, but they feel it's better than the alternative.  Even small groups might be disaffected and still not cause the elites to change their policies.  So, be careful with too many platitudes in this direction.  By this measure -- the majority always wins in the long-run -- the worst dictatorship or the most absolute monarchy is democratic, so the concept of "democracy" becomes useless for distinguishing between different forms of government.

Even there, It remains nevertheless useful to distinguish *political*
regimes from powers that are not political in nature, and so are
politically irresponsible by definition - that is, until a legal
system survives that protects them.

> Then you have to explain the empirical fact that central banks almost always tend to support the ruling faction in government via their monetary policies.

I would if this were true. I am on the contrary inclined to believe
that central banks tend to support their lacqueys in political classes
and governments, and that the financial system behind them has a
substantial word upon whom is going to be "elected".

> Also, that the Fed is private in some sense means little here.  Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were regarding as private, but they had an implicit guarantee of being bailed out; they both had a special position in the market, being created by the federal government.

I suspect this is a matter of perspective. With respect to Freddie Mac
and Fannie Mae, one could more plausibly say that the federal
government is regarded as a public entity, but ends up serving private
interests and being controlled to some extent by the latter.

-- 
Stefano Vaj