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Cake day: March 28th, 2024

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  • Holy shit. I get it! That’s a great explanation and I really appreciate your taking the time to type it all out. I’m glad we don’t have Lemmy medallions to award but, if we did, I’d give you one. I now see how a 100% reserve requirement, i.e., all deposits completely backed in cash, would entirely change banking.

    The only thing that feels weird to me is the virtual money the bank creates doesn’t seem go away once it’s paid back. For example, if a mini bank only had $1000 and lent $900 with a 10% reserve, they’d end up with $1900 once the loan is repaid (ignoring interest). Or does the $900 they lent create a -$900 for the bank that is cancelled through repayment?


  • I’ve been thinking about it and it still doesn’t make sense. I’m a scientist, not an economist, so it’s wildly out of my wheelhouse. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction?

    Here’s where I’m hung up. Let’s assume a 10% fractional reserve and, for the sake of simplicity, just one bank and a dramatically simplified deposit/loan scenario, just to minimize the number of hypothetical people and transactions.

    Person A deposits $1000. Bank lends $900 to person A which is sent to Person B.

    Person B deposits $900. Bank lends $810 to person B which is sent to Person C.

    Person C deposits $810. Bank lends $729 to person C which is sent to Person D.

    Person D deposits $729. Bank lends $656 to person D which is sent to Person E.

    Let’s stop there. So we have one initial deposit of $1000, which has resulted in an additional $2,493 in deposits ($3,493 in total) and $3,095 in loans. The bank is now receiving payments, plus interest, on over 3x the amount of actual money it was actually given. To me, it seems like the bank is figuratively “printing money” and gaining interest on it. Nothing I’ve read on fractional reserve lending has suggested this is incorrect.

    Halp!






  • This is further proof that, for every statement made, no matter how whimsical, there exists at least one person online who will tell you that you’re wrong.

    -The Earth revolves around the sun.
    -Ackchyually, they all revolve around the galactic center…

    -Godzilla floats by increasing his volume.
    -Ackchyualllllly, his volume doesn’t increase because lungs are on the outside… (Wtf?!)

    -Cotton candy is my favorite fair food.
    -Ackkkkkkchyualllllllllly, my review of the last three years of your comment history proves your favorite fair food is not, in fact, cotton candy. I have gathered and will prove this with ten points. Point one: your childhood experience with Geoffrey the Giraffe suggests…