Our modern banking and monetary system

In our changing world much that is written about economic institutions and problems has a way of becoming outmoded all too quickly. Institutional structures and practices constantly change and new problems emerge. From time to time, therefore, a book on banking and monetary systems must be reexamined and its contents reappraised. This fourth edition, like its predecessors, is designed to achieve two fundamental purposes: first, to describe the nature and operations of our money and banking systems; second, to apply modern monetary theory and banking theory to present-day domestic and international problems. Although the principal objectives have not changed, the contents have been appreciably altered in certain areas. Some material no
longer essential to the understanding of today's problems has been eliminated and new material has been added. The graphic representations of some aspects of monetary and income theory have been expanded. Current controversies related to the effectiveness and the results of the use of monetary policy, both to restrain and to expand total expenditure, have been examined in greater detail. The effects of the expanding role of the non bank financial intermediaries and the effect of cyclical changes in bank portfolios are taken into account. In the area of international financial relationships the treatment is directed largely to an
examination of the achievement of nonresident convertibility by Western Europe in 1958, the emergence of a gold-exchange standard based on the dollar and the pound as key currencies, and the problems arising therefrom.