(There is an overlap here with the Mints thread.)

I write regarding Pat Gunning (and others) on the 
long-argued desirability of disposing of 
fractional reserve banking. What follows may not 
be HET in Roy's sense, but I think the point is 
germane to the current discussion.

Does "economic thought" need to be grounded in 
feasibility? Do advocates of this reform not 
realise that they would be hoping to wipe out 
possibly the most powerful and profitable 
industry ever? Aren't these folks bigger than 
tobacco and bigger than guns? (Maybe the banking 
"system" is the US is mmade up of many small 
banks, but here in Australia we the Big Four.) 
Does anyone seriously think that any government 
would have the practical ability to do this? Is 
it legitimate in HET to describe a proposal as 
breathtakingly naïve? (For one thing, people's 
share portfolios in banks would be slashed in 
worth, and there'd be riots in this country.)

"One does not need Keynes to tell us this, does one? On the contrary,
it might not be too far-fetched to peruse that the reason why a 100%
reserve depository system seems so strange today is that the
Keynesian-oriented economics textbooks during the 50s and 60s, and
each of the 'ties since, became fixated on teaching the fractional
reserves system, regulated by the FED, as if it was the final
solution to the monetary problems that are likely to occur during
business cycles, including those of the Great Depression." (Pat Gunning)

The simplest explanation of Keynes's position is 
that he has some common sense, isn't it?

Sorry to be so curt.

Bruce Littleboy