[Gianni]

Takeit: I have now seen you refer to this 80million that H created 'out of thin air' about a hundred times. I've looked around a bit, not too seriously, but haven't found any good info. Was this credit? Are you suggesting that Hamilton was the first to suggest we all live high on the hog at the expense of future generations?

I'm genuinely interested in more info on this, in spite of my smart-assedness. Creating 80 mil "out of thin air" is a talent I would definitely like to learn more about :)

[GOPcapitalist]

Are you suggesting that Hamilton was the first to suggest we all live high on the hog at the expense of future generations?

Knowing his way with words, he probably both is and is not at the same time. Don't ask how he does it though.

[Grand Old Partisan]

He was referring to Hamilton's program which converted nearly worthless government securities issued before the Constitution into financial capital and money.

[justshutupandtakeit]

The best description of the financial program I have seen is Forrest MacDonald's biography Alexander Hamilton.

Essentially what happened is the assumption of the federal and state debt and exchanging it for the newly issued debt under Hamilton's program created a money supply since the debt became the equivalent of money. It was sold for specie and thus, that specie came into this country as new capital.
Bank stock became the basis for loans and created a new source of money.

Thus, based upon the word of the United States government capital flowed in from across the world and from within this nation. That is as close to the creation from thin air as I can imagine. Though you might want to argue that it was created from parchament since that is what the constitution was written on and what ultimately allowed it.

Since the old debt was not totally valueless you can modify the quantities by subtracting its value from 80 million to get a net increase. Maybe it was worth 10% of its face value as currency so I'll just say 70 million.

Anyway MacDonald's book is a great work by one of America's greatest experts on that era.