11th Oct 2012: Why did the financial crisis happen? (and what to do about it) by Ben Stollery and Fran Boait

positive money

On the 11th of October Ben and Fran will be giving a talk at the Counting House in Edinburgh on the following subject…

Name of speaker and subject:

Ben Stollery and Fran Boait
We are in a crisis because so few of us, including policy makers, economists and journalists fully understand how our monetary system works. This is a dangerous situation to be in when money drives almost all activity on the planet. If you want to understand how the system works well, at least the basics – come along!

Bullet points of what you would like to cover:

  • How does the current financial system work?
  • Who creates money?
  • How much do they create?
  • What do they do with the money they create?
  • Why is there a problem with this system?
  • We would like to finish off with a few ideas of how the system could be changed.

Suggested you-tube links, websites and / or texts where
further information may be found:

www.positivemoney.org.uk

www.moveyourmoney.org.uk

 
A few words about you and your passion:
We are passionate about social justice and the huge environmental crisis we face, but have come to realise that one of the root causes of these problems is our flawed global monetary system. We are convinced that meaningful and positive change cannot occur in an economy that is permanently tilted towards boom and bust cycles through the unregulated creation of massive debt. We are not economists, but think we understand enough in order to increase the awareness of others, and get them to engage with the subject.
 

debt

A few lines about the history of your subject:
The fundamental cause of the economic and financial crisis that began in late 2007 was a decade of injudicious lending by the finance sector loans that primarily financed asset speculation, rather than investment in the productive economy. The private debt bubble this caused is unprecedented, probably in human history and certainly in the last century.
The sustained economic depression and societal hardship that we are seeing now in the UK, is primarily due to the reckless lending behaviour of banks, and a deliberate lack of regulation by our government. The recent growth in sovereign debt is a symptom of this underlying crisis – not the cause – and the current political obsession with reducing sovereign debt will only exacerbate the crisis, which in fact came about because of an explosion in private sector debt.
 

Click here for events listing…