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Comment by alibaba_x | Hacker News Reader

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alibaba_x·

>our own Fed

It's actually privately owned and not public.

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It's controlled by the US government and the US Treasury receives the proceeds.

https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/about_14986.htm

Read the last few sentences critically. Each regional federal reserve bank (there are several) is owned by private banks. The profits are merely capped.

The ownership is nothing more than symbolic. They have absolutely no control over the Federal Reserve. They can set no policy, they dictate nothing through the 'ownership.' They receive profits in exchange for participating in the system, it's a lure for drawing in private banking participation.

The profit share ("dividends") the banks receive is trivial, a couple percent of the Fed's profits. Typically 96-98% of profit is sent to the US Treasury.

Who sets the policy?

I have no idea why you're being downvoted; anybody should be able to understand that the Fed is independent (from the "government" in the typical sense of the word, but especially from private interests) by simply googling it. Do these conspiracy theorists really believe the Fed is secretly controlled by a cabal of private banks or something?

Not sure why you’re being downvoted. The Board of Governors is an agency, but there are 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks that carry out private operations. Critically, the FOMC, the monetary policy setting function, is a function that is carried out by the private regional banks. Most notably, the bailouts and private meetings back in 2008 were carried out by the president of the NY Fed.

It's not part of the federal government, but it's supposed to be controlled by the federal government. The Board of Governors is an independent government agency that runs the fed. I would call it quasi-public.

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