Serial Number Transparency
Please cite the paper as:
“Liam McDermott, (2012), Serial Number Transparency, World Economics Association (WEA) Conferences, No. 3 2012, Rethinking Financial Markets, 1st November to 31st December, 2012”
Abstract
If American’s vote to force Congress to assign individual serial numbers to electronic dollars, the global economy will undergo a renaissance.
All private and business bank accounts retain the exact same amount of cash, but by placing individual serial numbers on these electronic dollars they become “real” in the same sense that paper ones are. Trillions of “derivative dollars” currently present on large investment banks Off Balance Sheet books become worthless because they are derived and by definition, not real. The remaining pool of money is clean, reliable and transparent. Since this new pool of money is much smaller, the value of each individual dollar is greatly increased.
In order to protect the purity of this new pool of money, the Federal Reserve will no longer be able to arbitrarily create money. The majority of Americans would be outraged to learn that the Federal Reserve Bank is actually a private corporation, owned and operated by twenty one, MOSTLY FOREIGN banks. These banks currently use the Fed to create cash for themselves while paying interest to themselves. The Fed operates cloaked in secrecy, with total autonomy, creating money with no oversight from the Federal Government. Serial numbers would make the 7.7 trillion dollars the Fed fabricated out of thin air for their 2008 bailout disappear, restoring the value of the dollar to its pre-crash levels. Serial numbers wrest control of the American Dollar from the clutches of unregulated foreigners and places it back in the hands of the American people whom it is supposed to represent. When banks need more cash they would now petition Congress. Bankers would present their case for a cash auction and it would be put to a vote. Banks would now pay interest to the government for their cash, lessening the burden of the American Taxpayer. The economy will be well served by having a static amount of cash to represent the goods and services it has the ability to produce. As the capacity of the economy grows, more money would be injected into the system by Congress reflecting an increase.
Banks’ secret electronic trading platforms now would be replaced by open outcry trading pits, effectively ending backroom market manipulation. A system of three main pits where brokers openly trade equities, debt and commodities would be outfitted with cameras broadcasting real time, worldwide for free. This will ensure all market participants equal access to information. Imagine the world’s greatest reality show that everyone can bet on from home.
Politician’s campaign dollars serial numbers will make all of their allegiances instantly visible. Regardless of where on the
political spectrum they lie, every American has a right to know what his candidate is going to do once elected. A politician’s true agenda is shaped in the interests of their contributors, not their constituency. Democracy is muddled into a sham when it lacks this transparency.
Serial numbers will cripple the finances of terrorist and criminal organizations by stopping electronic black money flows. Any illegal activity would become an all cash business. While this would not end crime, it would destroy enterprise criminal corruption, while at the same time making money real for honest people who really work for their money.
This new form of naked capitalism will insure pure liquidity through pure transparency. Regulation will come about organically, based on the simple fact that everyone can see what everyone else is doing. Serial numbers enable the American economy to work the way it was intended, honestly, transparently and with equal access to information.
The American Dollar is based on accountability whether it is on a computer server, or printed on a bill in your wallet. No institution should have the power to create, manipulate and devalue the dollar bill for which millions of people have put in an honest day’s work. A true American, capitalist democracy demands its financial, political and criminal framework to be illuminated by serial numbers.