Before our PA Governor-appointed public official guest joins us, I discuss how autonomous cars expect to change real estate.

Richard Vague, Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Banking and Securities from 2020-2023 joins us. We’re in the state capital of Harrisburg, PA.

We discuss America’s beginnings in real estate and banking from around 1800.

He tells us about the health of banks in the wake of recent failures due to higher interest rates.

I ask Richard about full reserve banks vs. fractional lending banks.

Great Britain prohibited colonists from owning land west of the Appalachians.

The basis of early land wealth were crops grown on the land—wheat, corn, tobacco, indigo, and rice.

Mortgages around 1800 were often 50% LTV and 6% interest rates.

Here in the 2020s, Richard believes that private sector debt is a larger problem than public debt. Wherever debt growth is most rapid are where the economic cracks exist.

Inflation benefits the Top 10% of the economic strata.

Private debt becomes unsustainable around 225% of GDP. In the US, it’s currently 160%.

You become insolvent when you cannot make interest-only payments. That’s true for you as an individual, or a nation.

If these topics interest you, check out Richard’s new book, “The Paradox of Debt” at ParadoxOfDebt.com.