There are lots of arguments both for and against fractional reserve banking. But no matter what the arguments are we have what we have and I always have said I play by the rules given me.

I have been a big beneficiary of fractional reserve banking. As farmers a lot of us have. It allowed us to grow our farms much faster than we ever could have with organic growth like my dad did. But at the time my dad was a young freshly married man there was a farmstead on every quarter section with a house and family. Diversified with livestock and row crop. I got to clean up a number of those old home sites, picking up the rock foundations. Was fractional reserve banking the demise of those farmsteads???? I don't think so. I think there were lots of other factors involved. But I think one thing is for sure. The ones who learn how to play the game and are willing to take the risks will use fractional reserve banking to out compete their neighbors and grow their farms more than was possible if the easy credit was not available. Same goes for manufacturing.

Is it all bad or good? Damned if I know. And at any rate it is what it is.

In the 80's I learned how to play the game but luckily for me I was not smart enough or quick enough to learn it good enough to go broke and have to sell out. I went to auctions and saw guys buy farm after farm. Wondered how they did it. Where the money came from. Higher and higher prices paid. I only learned late in the game how they did it. At the time I was operating my farming operation on cash. Was not borrowing any money at the ripe age of around 22 or so. (I did use floor planning in the farm equipment dealership I opened - company financing).

Well after my divorce my new wife and I bought a brand new farm together and by that time I had learned to use credit (the divorce helped me out there). Bought the farm on time. Just about one year or so before the 80's "farm crisis" hit when interest rates went to double digit. We hung on by the skin of our teeth and never missed a payment. While neighbors around that had been the ones holding their hands up at the land auctions got sold out and bankrupt. They had learned how to play the game big time and did well till the rules of the game were changed and interest rates went balistic making them unable to service their massive debts.

I have been lucky a lot of times in my lifetime and that was one of them. I wasn't smart enough or quick enough to learn how to destroy my own operation. We just struggled along. But I had learned to use leverage and through that leverage fractional reserve banking provides grew our operation to eventually about 7,000 tillable acres (some of it purchased, a lot of it rented). We definitely were not the biggest farm operation  in the area but probably in the top 10%.  I definitely could not have done that without easy credit money. But how many other farmers did I out compete along the way by using that easy credit? I suspect several and had a few that were kind of pissed about it and probably did not hold my name in high reguard.

Easy credit can definitely make things grow for those who learn to use it to their advantage and are willing to take the risks involved with using leverage. So there are definitely positives and I certainly have been a BIG beneficiary of those positives. But at what cost to general society and others without the drive to expand????

Like I say. It is what it is. It's not likely to change anytime soon. So I play by the rules laid out. And fractional reserve banking with easily expandable money supply is the current and likely long term rule. 

Look up mises.org if you want to hear the other side of the argument. I'm not smart enough to argue it well, but it sounds pretty good to me and has for a long time. Even when I was a bank board member.