this is where bernanke meets with his six fellow governors of the federal reserve, all of them appointed by the president of the united states. bernanke also chairs the federal open market committee, which decides interest rates. when i called and proposed this interview about a year ago, your representative laughed out loud and said, "the fed chairman never does an interview." i wonder, why are you doing this? >> well, it's an extraordinary time. it's an extraordinary time. this is a chance for me, i think, to talk to america directly. >> and a chance for us to understand where he comes from. [rail crossing bell dinging] ben shalom bernanke grew up in one of the few jewish families in dillon, south carolina, today a town of about 6,000 people. his grandfather jonas immigrated from eastern europe, landed at ellis island, and came here to start a drug store. >> our family came here in 1941. my grandfather, jonas bernanke, bought this building, made it into the jay bee drugs, after his initials. >> later, his father and uncle took over the store, which has since become a restaurant. we're

september but they actually haven't been purchasing any government bonds the balance sheet of the federal reserve today is the same size as it was two months ago so the fed a reserve has to put some juice into the system if it wants to get the stock market rising as a really interesting and good point now let's talk about what has occurred turned the most during the last obama term there is this great chart i'm going to put it up for our viewers and it shows all of these different assets and what they've returned and gold and silver lead the way now we're told by neoclassical economists and policymakers that the fed needs to print and we need to spend to get on a good growth track and rebuild a healthy economy but what does it mean that a non dividend yielding asked that two of them actually have performed the best out of all these financial assets. you know it's not really a return on gold it's just the appreciation of gold or to be more precise the depreciation depreciation of the purchasing power of the dollar you know gold buys the same amount of crude oil it did four years ago same thing wit

has to keep inflating or the system is going to collapse because the federal reserve has expanded its balance sheet over the cup the last couple of months you know there's been a lot of talk about doing it but the market wants to see some action and as a consequence you're seeing a sell off pretty much across the board in most markets really interesting and speaking of central bank inflating one thing you look at oil prices they look very different depending on which currency you're looking at i want to bring up a chart and this is from gold money this is this is your chart and it shows that crude oil prices from the seventy's to june of two thousand and twelve and palace and dollars and euros and gold grams and what's incredible is that the purchasing power of gold in terms of oil it's been able to buy the same amount for decades unlike all of these other national currencies why is that. it's basically because gold is money it's not consumed like other assets it's accumulated and this aboveground stock of gold grows by approximately the same amount as world population and new wea

bank part of the federal reserve bank system and ben bernanke in testimony to congress said that. the federal reserve banks and central banks around the world only hold gold as a matter of tradition so why go through this elaborate. sort of security system there must be millions and millions and millions and billions of dollars of a ninety ton steel cylinder three. hundred forty ton steel and concrete frame if it's just tradition exactly because bernanke is speaking out of both sides of his mouth these are deployed as nightmarish ghoulish it but the fact is that going forward gold is the only thing that's going to keep the economies afloat and that's why there's a mad scramble for gold that's why since two thousand and nine central banks for the first time in thirty years ben buyers met buyers all of gold and make the following prediction when the paper apocalypse hits you'll find central banks printing money not to buy bonds but to buy gold that's one gold bricks out to ten thousand dollars an ounce that's when the global market collapses that's when we have a new paradigm shift

hold, you know, with the federal reserve. and we currently pay interest on those reserves, interest in excess of those reserves, of 25 basis points, one-fourth of 1%, very, very low interest rate that we pay. now, i can say parenthetically that this ability we have to pay interest on reserves is going to be very important in the future because when the time comes to raise interest rates, one of the tools that we have to do that will be this interest on excess reserve, which we can raise at the appropriate time, and this is in the power of the board of governors to raise and by raising it, we will make -- we will cause short-term rates across the spectrum to rise because banks obviously are not going to lend into money markets at a price lower that they can get from the fed. so, this is a very important instrument from us and we will be using that at some point, at the appropriate time to begin to tight monetary policy. now, you're talking about the other direction, why don't we just cut it to zero, pay no interest on excess re

despite frankfurt has one thousand and thirty six tons or thirty one percent of germany's gold the federal reserve bank of new york has one thousand five hundred thirty six tons or forty five percent of all of germany's gold bank of england has four hundred fifty tons or thirteen percent bank to france has three hundred seventy four tons or eleven percent well that's not going to return to germany because as you head to the cliff whether stuff fiscal cliff or the bond cliff the gold held in america on behalf of germany will not be returned but germany knows this and that's why germany is ransacking the economies of europe right now because they have their eye on the gold in greece for example greece had to pledge on eleven tons of gold to germany when they signed off on the memorandum to become beholden to the troika when they lost their sovereignty it only has twenty four hundred tons of gold i predict that italy will have to put that gold into the coffers of germany so germany is playing a game here where they're bankrupting europe by cutting off the credit spigot in return these countries will

federal reserve gives it to the banks that zero percent of the banks give it to you or i know treasuries in a closed loop making profits off of you and i. think you know dr jill stein your opening statement please thanks so much it's great to be here and thank you so much to our team and for you well the american people certainly are at the breaking point but in this election we can turn that into a tipping point and start to take back our democracy and the peaceful of just green future we need to serve we are in crisis now we are the american people are losing our jobs decent wages our homes affordable health care and higher education our civil liberties are under attack. and the climate is in an accelerated meltdown the wealthy few are making out like bandits doing better than ever while every day people are being thrown under the bus and the political establishment is actually making it worse imposing austerity on everyday people while they squander trillions on wars for oil wall street bailouts and tax breaks for the wealthy that's why it's time to stand up and make your v

will buy certain security so ok our federal reserve is doing that now to the tune of forty billion a month and maybe more and they'll keep buying them up to keep interest rates this low our interest rates are at a half percent a quarter percent i'm sorry overnight really european just barely european central bank still had seventy five points point seven five percent they should be dropping their overnight rate to a point two five percent and why because it helps it helps by keeping interest rates this low you are allowing cheaper money everywhere and you know the problem with spain and now portugal and of course italy and greece there's six percent plus treasury rates are killing them they can't pay that debt now but it's not a sinner but a cheer for a change an optimistic note hala great in sort of pop freakonomics dot com thanks pete on the program they are quite welcome kevin pleasure right ok let's talk business not no much cheering for in the u.k. you paying for gas is a bit of a scandal or a citizen to rumble over them scandals taken it too far but there's a there's a compla

politics of the federal reserve already example of how you just started to see a change thanks strong paul and there'll be a vigorous discussion about this tonight and we didn't see that kind of discussion much in the big presidential scrum between the two parties and that's one way that we can affect politics now is that we can sort of force people force the two parties to start being more responsive whether that means we can ever begin to trust them i tend to think not but it's certainly a new. avenue for doing things ok thank you very much that's going to do it for now joining thanks for joining us matt made thank you thank you for having us the final define a. final the final babies are in gary johnson and jill stein is just minutes away and then i'm christina televen founder free and equal elections foundation and i'm tom hartman host of the big picture the anchors of our team had a bit to say about these third party candidates earlier take a look at their discussion and we'll see you at debate time. happy election eve everyone coming up shortly in our key american studios

federal reserve bank of the american bank so they fear ceding sovereignty to these foreign governments and there seems to be a lot of tension along those lines given the trends that we see isn't that fear justified i think it is justified in fact when you see the bundesbank position portrayed in the media they talk about it the george c. of it as if they're isolated though nobody agrees with them but that illustrates the point all these institutions you just mentioned there. pushing the same for lack of a better word globalist agenda taking sovereignty not just away from potentially the weaker euro area sovereign countries who do need help you could say but also the strongest of all including germany and how do the germans feel about that well they have a natural suspicion of it to begin with and know their own as i used the word a moment ago revered as it were buddhist bank is warning them that this process has already gone too far that there are certain powers that they should not give to the e.c.b. they should not give to brussels the powers of the bailouts you use the word globalis

federal reserve chairman ben bernanke warns congress to avoid the fiscal cliff, saying even the federal reserve doesn't have the tools to deal with the consequences. >> tom: i'm tom hudson. this man has many lawmakers pledging never to vote for higher taxes. find out what grover norquist thinks will happen with the fiscal cliff. >> susie: and hewlett packard stuns investors with news of an $9 billion mistake. >> tom: that and more tonight on nbr! >> susie: federal reserve chairman ben bernanke came to new york city today to send a tough message back to washington-- get your act together. he urged lawmakers and the white house to reach a quick deal to avoid the fiscal cliff, saying it might mean next year could be "a very good one for the economy." ben bernanke didn't endorse any specific tax or spending policies to solve the fiscal cliff, but he urged lawmakers to think creatively. he said an agreement on ways to reduce long-term federal budget deficits could remove road blocks to growth. on the other hand, going over the cliff might mean a recession. on top of that, worries about a dea

we have high deficits in the government sector and we also have you know zero rates from the federal reserve so those are big problems from a secular perspective but i think it's it is sustainable on a cyclical perspective and which means what that the central bank is propping this up enough that were going on this enormous going on going forward right you know the economic cycle will take its course and we're you know moving upward in the trajectory for this cyclical upward cycle and at some point you know the site was going to wane whether it does it of its own accord or as a result of the fiscal cliff you know it's to be determined but when that happens then the question is about sustainability over the secular you know the longer term period but over the cyclical period that is over the short to medium term say out to a year or two i think it is sustainable what we're seeing right now ok but what about depending on who is president one of the concerns from folks that are saying the markets are worried that you know with mitt romney for example this could mean another fed chairman and ben

districts it's also known as these summary of commentary on current economic conditions by the federal reserve district so i guess beige book is a little more concise now it's published eight times per year two weeks before each of the eight annual federal open market committee meetings now the report contains several sections and main summary of followed by the breakdown of the twelve federal districts now each district report will highlight the region's major industries so not all the reports mention the same sectors in the atlanta region for example there is a particular focus on tourism of course you have florida there where as the energy industry is highlighted somewhere like dallas and kansas city and that region you'll hear a lot about farming so staffers at each of the twelve regional banks all these banks you see here they compile the information after contacting businesses economists and other financial experts by phone through questionnaires and just plain old e-mail now the businesses range from retailers and home builders to hotels and restaurant owners and the questions if you wa

i mean just run through an experiment mentally if the federal reserve went out and they said you know things are terrible in the u.s. with regard to fiscal sustainability and the debt and so forth so we're going to go we're going to buy up one of the existing treasuries and we're going to just take it into the federal reserve what would happen as a result of that and they said categorically this is a one time decision that we're going to make the first thing you notice is the u.s. government prints money that is their own currency it's a liability they've created it's not some external liability that they have to do they can just you know buy it up secondly if it's a one off then what you see is an immediate fall in the price level you see rising inflation but it's not necessarily sustained inflation so the point is when you talk about sustainability it's completely sustainable it's their own currency it's not the same as in greece or in you know in germany even where they have debt to g.d.p. of over eighty percent. currency user that could completely go bankrupt because unless the e.

some are investors like these attending the chicago federal reserve bank's annu agriculture conference. while farmers still account for about three-quarters of the farmland purchased in the u.s., investors account for the rest and their numbers are growing. jon brorson manages three agriculture funds for mesirow financial that include 26 farms. he says individual and institutional investors are only beginning to realize the profit potential of farming. >> it's an asset that they fly over to florida or drive through to visit grandma. they're not used to thinking of it in terms of an investment. >> reporter: brorson says mesirow's funds have a five-year return rate topping 20%. while some investors are making money renting land to farmers, others are making profits on a combination of rents and bonus payments from grain sales. still other investors operate the farms entirely. >> we will hire out a custom farmer to plant, fertilize and harvest. we take the crop then and we insure it. we might hedge it, sell forward. >> reporter: competition for farmland is hot and it's not easily purchase

amount of reserves that the banks hold, you know, with the federal rereceiver, -- reserve, and we currently pay interest on excess reserves of 5 basis points, one-forth of 1%, a very, very low interest rate that we pay. now, i say paraphernalia -- it's important in the future because when the time comes to raise interest rates, one of the tools we have to do that will be this interest on excess rereceivers which -- reserves which we can raise in a period of time which is in the interest of the board of governors to raise, and by raising it, we will make -- we will cause short term rates across the spectrum to rise because banks, obviously, are not going to lend into money markets at a price lower than they can get from the fed. this is a very important instrument for us, and we'll be using that at some point, at the appropriate time, to begin to tighten monetary policy. now, you're talking about the other direction, why not just cut it to zero, pay no interest on excess reserves, and thereby, get more accommodation? well, it's something we've considered repeatedly, and we continue to consid

despite last summer's drought, the value of farmland in the federal reserve's seventh district, which includes iowa and illinois, continued to increase in the double digits. jim farrell is the president and c.e.o. of an omaha-based farm real estate firm. he says last month alone, his company oversaw more than $160 million in farmland sales. >> the level of interest was phenomenal, and we were selling them at higher prices than we anticipated they would sell at before we went into the auction. >> reporter: who's buying farmland? some are investors like these attending the chicago federal reserve bank's annual agriculture conference. while farmers still account for about three-quarters of the farmland purchased in the u.s., investors account for the rest and their numbers are growing. jon brorson manages three agriculture funds for mesirow financial that include 26 farms. he says individual and institutional investors are only beginning to realize the profit potential of farming. >> it's an asset that they fly over to florida or drive through to visit grandma. they're not used to thinki

the department of justice in the united states is less that's how the federal reserve has been complicit in providing zero interest rate policy which is negative for everybody except wall street and go into greater detail with all those aspects you know there's a great extension of the fraud into the virtual markets and gaming markets because we see that in trade which is the irish stock market virtual stock market where you can buy and sell both obama and romney has now been involved in a manipulation scandal from the operatives in the romney campaign who have been they believe the price of his contract to hire because they know that in america the media would then report on a higher price as somehow indicative of momentum which then is played in amongst the general. population of voters who are getting screwed by these wall street monstrosities romney and obama and being said by another derivative of wall street a prediction market out in trade all helped along by the mainstream media as you mention the mainstream media shameless as a nomi there's nothing in america really the new york

and zero percent interest rate pursued by ben bernanke the chairman of the federal reserve bank when he goes to congress and testifies why he's doing this he says well you know we have to keep on guard for deflation and we don't see much inflation in the system well over the past twenty years name change the definition of inflation at least twice they don't kluge food and energy if they calculate inflation as they did twenty years ago the inflation rate including energy and food would be running at nine percent which is very very high and bernanke if he was responsible and he was. numbers in and responsible way have already started raising rates two years ago three years ago four years ago to head off this inflation but no easy gains in quantitative easing and artificially low interest rates which are creating amongst other things the so-called fiscal cliff that's completely fabricated and invented by bernanke irresponsibility at the federal reserve bank he's created one hundred million people around the world him and his fellow central bankers being thrust back into poverty as we ca

block these efforts claiming our nation can't afford it but a new report by the san francisco federal reserve bank shows republicans are lying according to the report each dollar of federal highway grants received by a state raises that state's annual economic output by at least two dollars that's because with more americans working and collecting a paycheck they can afford to spend money which stimulates the. economy they are the job creators after all the consumers plus have better roads and bridges companies can move their products around the nation at a lower cost more workers and businesses make more money more tax revenue comes into the government pays down our deficit this is econ one hundred one so the question is why are people still opposed to the government investing in our national infrastructure let's ask austin piers libertarian commentator and director of production of freedom or it's a go back thank you for having me glad to have you with us what is it about the difference between spending and investment that libertarians don't get well because nobody said that that investment

the federal reserve bank of my resources. to train you to. research the only competition and see where you can actually get the real understanding to be able to articulate what the macro economy is about and what the federal reserve is about. so this is what i have high school and college students act like they are ben bernanke and try to speak in his language and give a ben bernanke asked types which is ironic because the feds issues are with communication one of them today was a ninety annual national finals of the college by challenge you said that was a cute video tell me it was kid about that because that was horrifying to me but you tell me why that was to a mom all their kids get their kid to be three there's nothing cute about kids going in i can like court jesters in front of a despotic marks and be the mom the priest of the monastery yeah look you know what when i saw it it was three hurry kill me when i was going to the last don't really know if we have the last or second this is nuts this is actually kind of crazy is just think ab