Page 3274 - Week 11 - Thursday, 13 September 1990
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all you need to do to create wealth is to run the printing presses to create currency one step further; all you need to do to create credit is to plug into the computers and create unlimited electronic credit.
In Mr Clampett's fevered imagination, taxes will be abolished, prosperity will flow to all from unlimited credit at zero or 2 per cent interest. There will be no inflation under this regime, economists among us will be pleased to know. Inflation is not created by too much money chasing too few goods. Inflation is caused by interest rates. Once we abolish interest rates and create unlimited credit, inflation disappears. Economics is no longer a question of rational allocation of scarce resources; scarcity disappears. We just create credit and spend wildly in this no tax, no inflation Shangri-la. And we do not have to worry about the international economy. Some might say, "Well, this is wonderful for Australia, but we would have some balance of payments problems". There is no such thing, in the Clampett view, as foreign exchange or balance of payments constraints.
I have read this book. Mr Jensen laughed and said that I had wasted my $6, but I think he would agree that it was $6 well spent. I learnt a lot. Foreign investment does not exist; nor does foreign exchange. This is proved by Mr Clampett. A yen investment to Australia is only created into Australian dollars by a bank. It therefore follows that the yen investment is unnecessary. The bank could have just given you the Australian dollars without the yen investment.
Similarly I presume this bank, if we intend to travel overseas and go along seeking American dollar travellers cheques, would not want Australian dollars in exchange. It can simply create the American dollar travellers cheques out of thin air, just as it creates the Australian dollars by foreign investment. This is the blissfully simple truth of instant nirvana, the ultimate magic pudding. The whole world is wrong about economics. Only Mr Clampett and Mr Stevenson truly understand.
But this perfect world is not totally perfect. The villains of the piece are bankers with Jewish names. This is anti-Semitic nonsense. (Extension of time granted)
All is not perfect in this wonderful world. As Mr Clampett demonstrates, foreign landholders and bankers with Jewish names are the villains who have convinced us all that this simple truth does not apply. The financiers have conned us all, says Mr Clampett; but, yes, there is a remedy, a way of saving us all from these evil financiers and the politicians, economists and lawyers who have been conned by it.
I am sure that members of this house can guess what the solution is, given that Mr Stevenson is pushing the solution. The solution is the citizens initiated
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