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Comment by Eliezer | Hacker News Reader

Of course the Fed is a branch of the government, and one of the more powerful ones. Next you'll be telling me that the Supreme Court doesn't legislate civil rights because someone painted a word saying "judiciary" above it. I go by what things are, not by what they're called.

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So by your reasoning, Federal Express is also a branch of government? From Wikipedia: "The Reserve Banks are not federal instrumentalities for purposes of the FTCA [the Federal Tort Claims Act], but are independent, privately owned and locally controlled corporations."

I don't believe anyone would define it as a branch of the government. It is true that it is not under the Legislative, the Judicial, or Executive branches (source http://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/about_14986.htm), but it does not constitute some fourth branch of government.

From your link:

>The Federal Reserve System fulfills its public mission as an independent entity within government. It is not "owned" by anyone and is not a private, profit-making institution.

>As the nation's central bank, the Federal Reserve derives its authority from the Congress of the United States. It is considered an independent central bank because its monetary policy decisions do not have to be approved by the President or anyone else in the executive or legislative branches of government, it does not receive funding appropriated by the Congress, and the terms of the members of the Board of Governors span multiple presidential and congressional terms.

I really like how they say it isn't owned or for profit when the next paragraph down they say it has "special" shares, of which pay 6% in dividends by law. Nope no profits there, just magic money. Technically that isn't ownership, they're not real shares, and technically they dont turn a profit, all that goes to shareholders..

Their goal isn't to turn a profit. Almost all of the profits that they do get go to the federal government.

The member banks earn a 6% dividend on the amount of stock that they own in their regional Federal Reserve Bank. That amount of stock is determined by the member bank's balance sheet. They have to invest that money in the Federal Reserve.

I can't tell if sarcasm or severely misinformed.

The fed, is anything but federal. They are a group of private corporations owned by groups of banks within each reserve banks district. They can be somewhat controlled by congress by way of statute but rarely are and currently answer to no one but themselves. There is a lot of conspiracies around who or what group really owns the majority shares. I'm not going to go into the theory here as they are just that, theories.

In response to going by what they are not what they are called they very much are not a branch of government. They say this very plainly on their own website:

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

> I can't tell if sarcasm or severely misinformed

* Describes itself as "within government"

* Subject to congressional oversight

* Governors and Chair appointed by POTUS with oversight from the Senate

They aren't part of the government elected by the public, that's what many people class as important.

As for subject to congressional oversight, seems like pretty loose oversight if you ask me... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CY8xz3Q7aig

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