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We cannot create money and banks can, there is a huge power and wealth concentration in international finance atm.
HSBC laundering drug money in the USA. Proven in court. They didn't want to crack down hard on them because it could destabilize the USA economy. That means you have a problem.
But it is more the imbalance/lack of democratic control (we cannot even have the bits of control we'd have in pension funds where we can vote oversight and pick investments) I think that is the issue.
JWestland-
It depends on what you consider money / creating money to be, I guess - Banks extending credit & lending is increasing money by certain measures, but that's something that individuals can do too - the difference is scale. Both are regulated & restricted by how the market view their ability to lend.
Only a central bank can create money from nothing - and even then they are regulated internally (inflation targets, for example) & externally (trade deficits and the like).
There is a huge, increasing, imbalance. There are slaps on the wrist for criminal actions. There are plenty of problems. I don't think they are caused by having a fiat monetary system. I think they are caused by poorly regulated markets and corporate-centric social and taxation policy.
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We cannot create money and banks can, there is a huge power and wealth concentration in international finance atm.
Whilst true, we always have the option of quantitive easing, which is in essence the government selling bonds in the country, basically like releasing equity in a house, this does not have the risk of inflation as there is no new money. I do know I am slightly ignorant on these matters so happy to be corrected but as I understand it, this is a low(ish) risk way of the gov raising funds.
NotThamesWater
Bernhard
Debt & credit would exist anyway - what we have now is a de facto formalisation of that, with central banks adding stability & guarantee (to a greater or lesser extent).
The whole system arose because you have people that want to borrow money, and those people that have money to lend.
I don't think it's an inherently flawed system, nor that it's anything but a facilitator of inequality - I think you need to look across the whole gamut of tax, corporate law / workers' rights & finance for a way to explain that.