Tom Woods : Dynamics of the FED

DeBeers Diamonds and Oil/Gas industry

Were oil/gas prices going up or down? Was output going up or down?

Oil prices are going up AND production is going UP. Diamond prices are going up AND production is going UP.
Now I have called you out on it. ooooohh.

In the 19th cen oil prices were falling while output was rising. Check out Jim Powell's Bully Boy on Teddy Roosevelt and what was really happening in industries that were "monopolies" in the 19th cen. Despite all the rhetoric, it seems that prices in nearly all growing industries were falling.

I believe that both of us could be guilty of Post Hoc. There are tomes written on the subject. I use an objective review of history and civilization. There were Boom and Busts before the Fed and they will continue. The point is whether the current systems maintains a middle class (MC) better than the other. The MC is a primary indicator of the health of an economy, not just surpluses or deficits. The MC is the lubricant of a healthy economic machine.

Each one of those booms and busts was preceded by artificial credit expansion.

And UFO sightings? Whether the FED is there or not is irrelevant. These cycles have existed since the beginning of time. The FED was created to modulate them. Are they perfect? Show me a system that is. Has the standard of living increased significantly while the FED has been working? Hell yes. The world before central banking was no nirvana.