# Think Tank > Austrian Economics / Economic Theory >  Hoppe on Monetary Imperialism

## ClaytonB

Government, Money, and International Politics is one of my favorite Hoppe pieces (he has so many excellent pieces that it can be hard to choose). In it, he gives a succinct and extremely exact description of monetary imperialism -- why it exists, how it came into being and what its ultimate aims are.

When the central banking system is first correctly understood as a system of monetary imperialism, it can feel like "the scales have fallen from my eyes." Prior to going off the gold standard in 1971, the world economy was operating under the Bretton-Woods system. Hoppe explains the nature of monetary imperialism in this system:




> ... the first [stage of development of fiat monetary imperialism was] Bretton Woods. The U.S. is off the gold standard domestically, but it assumes the responsibility of redeeming paper dollars into gold (at fixed parity) vis-à-vis the German central bank, while the German central bank promises to exchange paper marks into paper dollars (at fixed parity). It would seem that Germany is still on the gold standard, for marks can be redeemed into dollars and dollars into gold. De facto, however, matters are completely different. The German central bank is pressured not to make use of its right to redeem dollar notes into gold but to use its dollars instead as reserves on top of which it creates mark notes. I will explain what is now in existence in the starkest possible terms in order to make the situation as clear as possible. Now let’s say the U.S. central bank creates $50,000 out of thin air and uses this money to buy DM 150,000 (assuming an exchange rate of 1:3) from the German central bank and then turns around and buys, let’s say, a Mercedes for this price. What does the German bank do with its $50,000? Does it buy something in the U.S. or insist on redeeming this sum into gold? The answer is of course, No. Rather, the $50,000 are registered as an increase in the bank’s dollar reserves, and given this increase, the German bank then creates an additional DM 150,000 out of thin air, and turns around and buys itself a new Mercedes, too.
> 
> Obviously, the U.S. now has a trade deficit with Germany: imports exceed exports. However, this is a “deficit without tears” because no payment (exports) is being made for the imported Mercedes, and the dollar does not fall against the mark. Instead, a system of two-fold exploitation is imposed on the German public. First, it gets ripped off by the U.S. central bank, then, facilitated by the first rip-off, it gets ripped off once more by its own central bank. We can call this system monetary imperialism.


The insidiousness of this system is easy to miss. The purchasing power of the US dollar does not decline _pro rata_ to the monetary expansion that the German central bank is compelled to accept because the German central bank will not be spending these dollars anywhere. The German central bank acts as a "dollar black-hole" and the Fed throws some "money" into that black-hole in order to "purchase" a Mercedes. One Mercedes is shipped from Germany and nothing of value (a German central bank ledger balance holding "dollars" that cannot be re-spent has no value) goes to Germany. In order to "balance accounts" between the US dollar and DM, the German central bank expands its money supply _pro rata_ to the US expansion by issuing new money. This allows the German government to rip off its citizens again. Note that the German central bank is capable of printing money without US monetary expansion to "back" its expansion. But when the German central bank expands its money supply in unison with the US central bank, this basically allows the US to "export" its inflation onto Germany. And that is the crux of monetary imperialism as it existed during the Bretton-Woods era.

Hoppe goes on:




> The second stage is like stage one except that gold no longer plays a role. All countries are on a pure fiat money standard. The U.S. initiates the process of inflation, and by using dollars as reserve currency, U.S. inflation is exported to U.S.-dominated countries, while goods flow into the U.S. in the same way as described before. Yet a run on the U.S. gold reserves is no longer possible, of course.


Since 1971, the "counter-point" that "we'll demand gold redemption!" is no longer available. US inflationary expansion must be accepted by Europe and all other US-dominated countries without so much as a whimper.




> As the final solution in the drive toward monetary imperialism and as a decisive intermediate step in the drive toward world government, the U.S. has been working long and hard to establish a U.S.-controlled world central bank issuing a single, world-wide accepted paper currency. Only then are all obstacles to government counterfeiting eliminated because then the currency can no longer rise or fall against any other as no other currencies are left.


Now we can see why all the apocalyptic prophecies of "One World Government" are true... it's just that the exposes have invested the whole conspiracy with a lot of irrelevant, sensationalized nonsense. The objective of the One Worlders could not be more boring and mundane: they want to have complete impunity to steal everything on the planet and to use military power to ensure they are in a position that no one can steal from them! So, there you have it... the great, grand conspiracy of the 13 bloodline Illuminati 33rd-degree Freemason Council of 300 Froot Loop Keystone Kop Brigade of World Domination is really just an elaborate game of three-card monte. A simple street hustle dressed up as the Wizard of Oz. And here we were all scared that the Prince of Darkness himself was about to jump out from behind a bush in all his cloven-hoofed ignominy.




> Once the public has grasped that government is a protection racket and a warmonger (rather than a protector and peacemaker), and that a central bank and government paper money are simply the government’s Department of Money-Counterfeiting and the instruments for continual redistribution of income and wealth in favor of the government and its friends, not only will we be spared the nightmare of world government and world paper money but we may actually see the restoration of the gold standard and the withering away of the state as a moral and economic perversity.


Let us hope that this awakening occurs. The Establishment is cocksure that it has found the ultimate recipe of world domination. I have reviewed speeches given by one-worlders and they all have the same smug attitude. They _just know_ that they've been let in on the ultimate secret of all reality and that they are unstoppable. They have concluded that their corrupt -- and insane -- system of human power is flawless. There is a day in store, however, for these arrogant traitors. Human arrogance will be shown for the joke that it is.

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## Origanalist

Trump is going to stop them.

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## ClaytonB

> Trump is going to stop them.


Trump _is_ "them". Predictably, he's been among the most pro-inflation Presidents in US history. As a creature of Wall Street, he sees it as "juicing the market" ... and that's always a good idea for somebody like him.

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## Swordsmyth

> Trump _is_ "them". Predictably, he's been among the most pro-inflation Presidents in US history. As a creature of Wall Street, he sees it as "juicing the market" ... and that's always a good idea for somebody like him.


Perhaps.
Or perhaps he just wants to label them bad for whatever they do.
They are bad no matter what they do, the Fed shouldn't exist and if people can be convinced of that it will be a good thing.

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## Krugminator2

> Predictably, he's been among the most pro-inflation Presidents in US history.


Current inflation rate:  1.6%

Would seem your statement is laughably untrue.

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## ClaytonB

> Current inflation rate:  1.6%
> 
> Would seem your statement is laughably untrue.


China's official, published internment and execution numbers are more believable than the Fed's inflation numbers.

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