We mentioned Silvio Gesell a few times in our blogs already but this article with Keynes' statement is indeed very telling: the latter merely proves that the top central banks are perfectly aware of the trickery and the ensuing psychological ramifications.
There are two major issues preventing money from serving humanity. The first one is the "subjectivity of value" which can only be stabilized by a monopoly (investing through currency buying). The 2nd one is "hoarding", which causes scarcity and disturbs the organic flow of money throughout the system, hence redirecting the velocity of money back to those in the know. Those who don't always lose. Gessell regarded hoarding as a key issue and drafted his theory based on that.
There isn't much to do because financial collusion is inherent to the framework itself. As soon as we believe that value is certified, we help fuel collusion. Assuming that free-markets can fix all doesn't take into account the inherent presence of collusion and this makes the top-down model inescapable. And of course, if nobody was hoarding it in order to eliminate the problem of scarcity, currencies - value - would end up falling apart.
Unfortunately, there are no in-between solutions. Either money exists or it does not.
The situation is spiritual in essence. This is the biggest spiritual battle ever in the entire Universe and which can only be won when (or if) 35% of the adult population starts screaming that "enough and enough". Another considerable argument in favor of a money-free framework is that money creates irreconcilable multiple layers of division among the people, simply because free-will will violate the Laws of Nature, as it cannot express itself positively when coerced.
Conflicts are thus here to stay.
The consensus that there exists some "necessary evil" is generally either the result of failing to see the big picture or the inability to access the appropriate data. Most people can see how the power elites operate but that very power game is repeated at all societal levels, and that makes it impossible to address the issue of power.
This pervasive and misguided psychology is what holds us back from overcoming generational ego-driven pursuits at the expense of others. Poverty is structural violence, no doubt about it but inherent to any top-down system. The pyramid of power can be reversed nonetheless at the condition that each of us comes to terms with the reality that we do not take anything with us when we die.
Soon banks are going to issue their own digital currencies and reshuffle the crypto games as they see fit. The fact is that the top-down system is the most nonsensical - and also harmful - model that civilizations have ever come up with. Why on earth would one support such a system when knowing that financial crises are inevitable, and pass on this burden to further generations?
We can militate for usury-free currencies all we want and that would be much of the problem removed, yet the end of the monopoly would cause so many fluctuations that people would beg the "money managers" to come back. Gesell was almost there but missed a few pieces of the puzzle.
We are definitely stuck for good unless we begin to adopt a very different mindset: competition has been detrimental to every civilization and we might have to learn this the very hard way.
The 'Strange, Unduly Neglected Prophet' | August 27, 201
Led by pacifist poets and playwrights, it has been called "one of the strangest governments in the history of any country." Gesell began pursuing a program that included land reform, a basic income for women with children and, of course, stamped money. But the job lasted less than a week — ending after another group of revolutionaries, this time led by hard-line communists, overthrew the anarchist poets and playwrights. A year later, after the German government reasserted control, Gesell was tried for treason. But, successfully arguing that his only role and purpose was to rescue the Bavarian economy, he was acquitted after a one-day trial and went back to writing.
In 1933, Fisher wrote a short book inspired by Gesell's ideas called Stamp Scrip. Fisher was an economist at Yale University, and he's now somewhat unfairly remembered for making overly optimistic predictions before the crash of 1929. He lobbied Congress to institute stamped money to provide relief to a distressed America. U.S. senators introduced a bill (S. 5125) that would have issued a billion dollars of stamped money to be distributed nationally. But it did not end up becoming law.
Silvio Gesell has been called everything from a "libertarian socialist" to an "anarchist" to a "free spirit" to a "crank." John Maynard Keynes had a much more affectionate term for him: a "strange, unduly neglected prophet."
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2019/08/27/754323652/the-strange-unduly-neglected-prophet