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In addition, the Fed is directly responsible for inflation and the decline in the US standard of living since 1913, and, besides the Great Depression, especially since the 1970s. From the late 18th century to 1913, virtually no inflation existed under the gold standard, except during times of war. Using government data, it now takes over $2,000 to equal $100 of pre-Fed purchasing power. In other words, a 1913 dollar is worth about a nickel, and given recent dollar weakness, even less.
Operating as a hidden government, Fed-created inflation dilutes purchasing power. It practices usury through interest rate manipulation, forcing borrowers to pay their rates. The income tax was established to pay interest on the national debt that wouldn't exist under a public banking system creating Treasury, not Federal Reserve notes.
The Constitution has no federal tax provision because the Founders believed private income was "the ultimate source of productivity." It wasn't coincidental that the February 13, 1913 16th Amendment (establishing an income tax) was ratified ahead of the year-end establishment of the Fed. It's run the country ever since, and when in trouble, gets the public to bail it out with more tax dollars, enough since 2008 to put a lien on future generations, perhaps in perpetuity unless public pressure forces change that won't come from the top down as long as bankers are in charge.
Congress empowered them to commit grand theft by transferring public wealth to themselves, a process especially virulent since the 1980s under Reaganomics-instituted "trickle-down" designed to trickle up. Ever since:
-- tax cuts for the rich replaced a progressive system;
-- the rich became super-rich;
-- consumer debt soared;
-- record high budget and national debt levels prevail;
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