Usury

Usury (from the Medieval Latin usuria, "interest" or "excessive interest", from Latin usura "interest") was defined originally as charging a fee for the use of money. This usually meant interest on loans, although charging a fee for changing money (as at a bureau de change) is included in the original meaning. After moderate-interest loans were made more easily available usury became an accepted part of the business world in the early modern age. Today, the word has come to refer to the charging of unreasonable or relatively high rates of interest.

Quotes

When once the usurer has obtained complete control of monetary creation, the interest mechanism has achieved its purpose, and could the be given up. When the usurer lent the original gold coinage, he created a debt claim and appropriated the interest. When, however, he began to create and lend money, he appropriated both interest and capital. Thus the usurer's (i.e. banker's) wealth and power finally derive from this credit creation, wherein, as Major Douglass puts it, "power comes not from charging interest but in creating new claims and appropriating them."

- Human Ecology p127

Books

• Human Ecology

Economics commentators

• Joseph Stiglitz
• Ron Paul
• Jim Cramer

Companies involved in Credit crunch

• Absolute Capital (Australian)
• Basis Capital (Australian)
• Northern Rock (British)
• Bear Stearns (American)
• Mac Bank
• New Century Financial

FBI probe widens to 17 firms Among companies implicated in FBI mortgage probes are Beazer Homes and Doral Financial. The largest US mortgage lender, Countrywide, is also under FBI investigation, authorities have said.

See also

• Currency
• W:Usury
• http://www.theproblemwithinterest.com/index.html
• The Money Masters
• Why today’s hedge fund industry may not survive