Film Review: System is Broken in ‘Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve’

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CHICAGO – Wealth inequality has never been higher, and much of it has to do with how the Federal Reserve Banks of the United States continues to allow the privatization of financial profits and taxpayer bail-outs (socialism) if these financial industries take a loss. This “too big to fail” equation is a result of policies in “Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve.”

Rating: 3.5/5.0

This is cold slap in the face for anyone believing in the dream of democracy and governmental checks and balances. The collection of countries and city states that make up the world exist mainly to feed the wealth of the upper one percent, and “Money for Nothing” exposes how those policies could lead to another collapse – this one with no bailout circumstances to fall back on, because there will be no monetary worth left. These are hard truths, and it does point towards our own humanity – in the sense that human beings who manage pools of money do so to make sure that they are set up, and their friends in the financial industries are also, but beyond that let the rest of us eat cake.

The history of the Federal Reserve is based on historical formations of “central banks” in Britain and Germany, which are designed to prop up lending and savings institutions in times of financial crisis. The upstart U.S.A. did not have such a system in place, and the result were up and down financial shifts that created market instability. Thus the Federal Reserve System was created in 1913, and created 12 regional “banks” that would monitor the cash flow of the United States.

Since then, the role of the Federal Reserve has evolved its role, mostly because of the severe economic trauma of the 1930s Depression. Basically it serves to put cash into the market in a downturn – low interest rates – and raise those rates to modify growth in strong economic circumstances. That formula has been increasingly obscured through complex and unregulated derivatives trading, housing bubbles and bail-outs for risky institutions that are ‘too big to fail.”

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of ”Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve”

Applause?: Alan Greenspan in ‘Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve’ Photo credit: Liberty Films

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of ”Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve”