You'll probably have a stroke when you learn that only checking accounts require reserves these days.
What they create, though, is the principle ONLY. Therefore the interest paid by the borrower is a net drain on the local, state, federal and ultimately global economy. This interest tribute is paid to the banks simply because they create money, for no other reason. So not only is interest paid on loans a net drain on the economy, it is also UNEARNED.
What about the interest banks pay to depositors? How about the risk they assume for defaults? What about their expenses for computers, networks, buildings, security, electricity, maintenance, and employees? If you think banks are making money for nothing, then buy stock in them you conspiracy minded kook ;-)
I am aware that liberalized FED policies have reduced the reserve requirements to zero in most cases today, expanding further the banking system’s ability to create money and credit. This is a veiled attempt at forestalling the inevitable downfall of the dollar as foreign central banks are losing their appetite for US debt. When you talk about operating expenses and interest paid to bank customers you are failing to mention that banks sell a product they create out of thin air, therefore their profits will always be sufficient, notwithstanding the virtually endless fees they charge for almost every type of transaction.
This will be my last attempt at explaining this to you. To defend bank created money is to defend a system, ultimately based on fraud, that has existed in some form or another since the middle ages. History is replete with examples of an educated populace becoming aware of the injustice and forbidding the practice of fractional reserve banking. This prohibition only lasts a few generations though, because time distances from the minds of the people the evils of this pernicious injustice.
Whenever the banks are defeated they merely sit back and wait for the mindless sheep to forget the bank failures and economic chaos their system visits upon the people. Eventually they show up again, with government permission, and fill the economy with cheap credit, creating the illusion of growth until the people wake up or the system collapses.
Finally, estimates say that the American people are in debt to the tune of over $40 trillion at present. The total M3 money supply is around $10 trillion. In other words, between personal, corporate and government debt, we owe 4 times the amount of money that exists on earth. Considering that the only way to create NEW money is with NEW debt, how long do you think this set up can continue?