There are a few major myths
that need to be dealt with in the Christian community. The first one is that
everything would be fine if we could just somehow return to backing our currency
with gold and/or silver.
Next, we have the issue of numerous Christian
economic advisors who write articles and instruct their clients in the myth that
they can work towards being “debt-free” – and actually attain that
goal.
Lastly, we have the myth that most of our economic problems began
in 1913 with the creation of the Federal Reserve and the Internal Revenue
Service.
I’m going to tackle myth #2 in this article – the ability to
become debt-free.
Most people correctly look at debt as something that
they owe to somebody else. However, they are very inconsistent in the way that
they define the amount of debt owed. Usually the list contains the mortgage,
car payment, student loan, and credit cards.
We need to first investigate
what debt actually is. Our entire economy runs on debt, which can be thought of
as “claims on the future labor of somebody or a group”. The $10 bill in your
wallet or purse was put into circulation by the Federal Reserve by them first
buying $10 worth of US Treasury securities from investors. Those treasuries are
backed by a promise from our Federal government that they will repay the amount
due at maturity, with interest. How does the Federal government get that
money? They collect it from our future labor. In other words, the $10 bill
that you have is backed by $10 worth of someone’s future labor. Somebody is a
debt slave to you.
Now here’s a question. What happens if the person
that was supposed to do that $10 worth of labor decided not to? What rights
would you have to make sure that your debt slave lived up to their
responsibilities that were imposed upon them by our US government selling them
into slavery? Could you go capture them and arrest them? Could you bind them
in chains in the public square as an example to those that may owe future labor
on the $20 dollar bill in your possession?
No! You have absolutely no
authority to make sure that your debt slave accomplishes the future labor that
they’re on the hook for. Instead, you are explicitly depending on the US
government to wield their “righteous” sword in order to cajole, threaten, beat,
and/or jail the debt slave into submission on your behalf.
You could be
the richest person in our nation, and yet have absolutely nothing to your name
if the debt slaves refuse to perform the future labor that you have claims on
through your debt notes (money). Do you see the issue? You may have “money”
saved for retirement, but you only have it as long as your debt slaves care to
perform their future labor.
We now turn our attention to the banks and
the US government. What happens if you have a bank loan that goes into
foreclosure? Do the banks have any means of “encouraging” you to make good on
the loan? Sure they do. They will physically come in and seek to take your
assets away from you. This is on a loan where the credit was created through
very little work on the bank’s part, and where the loan was completely new
“money”. The “money” was backed by your signature on the promissory note –
where you promised your future labor to pay back the loan. There is an illusion
that the loaned amount was actually funded by the deposits of others. Nothing
could be further from the truth. No loan is funded this way. Instead, the
deposits simply limit how much a bank can loan, but the loaned amount is
completely new money and increases the overall money supply by the loaned
amount.
What happens if you don’t give the government their “dues”? They
will take your assets, assess you extremely punitive fines, put a lien against
your wages, and very possibly throw you into jail.
You’re probably
wondering where I’m heading with all of this. Let’s assume for the sake of
discussion that you have $50,000 owing on your home mortgage, $20,000 on your
student loan, $10,000 on your car, and $20,000 on your credit cards. You hear
any number of Christian financial counselors on the radio that teach you how to
“get out of debt”. After three years you have managed to accumulate the
$100,000 to pay off all of the aforementioned debt! Woohoo! You’re debt
free!!! Right??? Wrong.
It’s commendable to get out of voluntary debt.
This is a goal that everyone should undertake. However, to tell people that
they are now “debt-free” is completely missing the much larger picture. You
see, there is still the subject of involuntary debt, or “implicit” debt that is
owed based upon the election of various government representatives. Let’s go
through and enumerate just a few of the areas where claims on your future are
still very much intact.
First, there’s the Federal government. You
already know about the various taxes and fees, so we’ll assume that you have
those covered. Next is your share of the US Treasury bonds that have been sold
to investors. You need to figure out how many taxpaying adults there are in
this country and divide the total bond debt by that number. We’ll toss out a
guesstimate of $100,000 for your share. Are we done? Not even close. Remember
all of those Social Security contributions that you have made over the years?
They’re gone – completely. Not only did you pay for those contributions the
first time, but now you get to pay even more for them the second time. You see,
the government stole your Social Security money for other uses and replaced that
money with IOU’s, bearing interest. What is an IOU? It’s debt. It’s a claim
on your future labor. So we have to figure out how much in “trust” fund debt
has been accumulated by our government over the years and divide that by the
total number of taxpayers. Let’s conservatively tack on another $100,000 in
debt for you.
We’ll now talk about the state level of government. Some
states collect taxes, others collect fees, and most collect taxes and fees.
That means more claims on your future labor. Then we have state treasury bonds
that are sold. This is a promise by your state to the investors that you will
put in lots of future work to make them all happy. How about your county? They
sell bonds as well – on the promise of your labor. How about your city or
town? Yes, they sell municipal bonds to make sure that your days are not spent
in idle relaxation.
I didn’t even touch on all of the other various taxes
that are owed on such things as utilities and fuel.
We’re going to make
the assumption that you owe $250,000 in involuntary debt. It would actually be
quite a bit higher than this, but my point will still hold.
What happens
if you manage to save $300,000? Does this mean that you can truly claim to be
debt-free, since the involuntary claims on your future labor are only $250,000?
One would think that the answer would be yes. Actually, the answer is
no.
This is where the first part of the article comes into play. That
$300,000 that you have is simply $300,000 worth of claims on the future labor of
others. Absolutely none of that labor has yet been completed. You have no
means of ensuring collection on your labor claims if those owing the labor
decide to spend their time napping in a hammock.
Meanwhile, you are still
on the hook for $250,000 of your labor to entities that can, do, and will take
it out of your hide if you seek to refuse them their unjust dues.
Are you
really debt free? No. Nobody is debt free in a completely debt-based economy
like we have. The Christian community needs to understand this, and understand
the biblical principal of whatever we call “currency” being based on labor that
has been completed, and where there is no future encumbrance upon the person who
has performed the completed labor. That, my friends, is freedom. That is
liberty. We live in tyranny.
Your comments are
appreciated…
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Thank you,
Chris Prang
