Was it worth saving a single million? There was a time period when such a sum was significant. That time is beyond the memory of anyone alive. In the years since the Great Inflation of the seventies, millions had given way to billions as any standard for “big.” Thus, sitting inside the hallowed halls of Congress in November 2005 and using a million-dollar savings as an excuse, there must’ve been far more than that to justify the more obvious flippancy.
This was not a per-institution kind of deal, either. According to a Federal Reserve spokesperson, the entire depository industry was about to be spared a collective million dollars of expense as nothing more than being set free from filling out tedious bureaucratic forms. On the opposite side of the paperwork, the central bank itself was counting on half a mil in its own savings.
Texas Congressman Ron Paul wasn’t buying this. Introducing the Sunshine In Monetary Policy Act on March 7, 2006, the well-known central bank critic smelled a rat. The Fed planned on terminating the publication of M3 over a measly five hundred thou? Oh, the irony.
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