Bioneers interview Ellen Brown on Public Banks to Finance Local Economies

Jun 14, 2019

Original appeared at TruthDig:

Ellen Brown is an attorney and leading public banking advocate, founder of the Public Banking Institute, and Senior Fellow of the Democracy Collaborative. She is the author of hundreds of articles and more than 10 books, including the best-selling Web of Debt, The Public Bank Solution and Banking on the People. She also co-hosts the “It’s Our Money” radio program on PRN.FM.

Bioneers sat down with Brown to discuss the speculative economy, public banking, and whether we could be headed toward another major financial crisis.

BIONEERS: Let’s start with a big picture. We’re more than 10 years past our 2008 financial crisis triggered by Wall Street banks. Can you talk about some of the worst effects that we’re still seeing now?

ELLEN: The rich are getting richer, as most people are aware, and the rich, of course, own the media, so they report that the economy is doing fine. But for the lower 80% of the population who are net debtors, it’s getting worse.

Consumer debt is ballooning. We have a massive homeless problem. We have a shortage of houses and jobs.

There’s a deficit of money in the system. And it’s not just the U.S. Virtually all countries are heavily in debt. So if everybody’s in debt — countries, businesses, individuals — who are they in debt to? They’re in debt to the banks. The reason…