Yesterday, the Federal Reserve announced its third interest rate cut this year, lowering rates to their lowest level in nearly three years.
If you’ve been watching the headlines, you probably heard the familiar talking points: the cuts will “stimulate growth,” “support consumers,” and “steady the economy,” but behind the soothing language lies something far more consequential, and far less “helpful”.
When the Fed “stimulates the economy,” it doesn’t send checks to working families or small business owners, and it certainly doesn’t suddenly start creating value by making a product or service that people need and want. It just pumps new money into the financial system—into banks, hedge funds, and government programs—where the ultra-wealthy and well-connected get access to it before anyone else.
They use that cheap money to buy assets like stocks, bonds, and real estate before inflation has a chance to set in. Bonus for them, when prices rise later, those assets are worth more, and they get to profit again.
By the time that new money trickles down to everyone else, it’s already devalued. Groceries, rent, cars, and utilities all cost more, and the dollars in your savings account buy less.
That’s not some conspiracy theory fringe idea, or unintended consequence. It's just the way monetary policy actually works.
When the Federal Reserve “prints money” or loosens money through rate cuts and asset purchases, the first beneficiaries aren’t working families. Instead, it’s banks, investors, and the ultra-wealthy—basically whoever gets access to that new money first.
(Hint: it’s never me and you)
This process even has a name: the Cantillon Effect.
It was first observed centuries ago by Irish merchant, banker, and adventurer Richard Cantillon who noticed that when kings (or central banks) debase a currency, the people closest to the source of new money always benefit first, and everyone else pays the price later.
Sound familiar?
That’s why, even in times of “economic growth,” the gap between the rich and the rest keeps widening. It’s not just market forces or bad luck; it’s the structure of the system itself.
This is one of the reasons we wrote The Tuttle Twins and the Creature from Jekyll Island.
Because kids (and most adults, honestly) are never taught how central banking really works.
They don’t know that the Federal Reserve was designed to quietly shift purchasing power away from ordinary people and toward government and financial elites.
When people learn this, they stop falling for the illusion that government spending makes us richer. They begin to see that printing more money doesn’t create more wealth, it just divides the same pie into smaller and smaller slices. So of course they don’t teach it in schools.
The Creature from Jekyll Island is a foundational lesson in understanding money—not just in theory, but in practice.
Right now, as the Fed cuts rates yet again and pours billions of dollars into the system, that lesson couldn’t be more timely. Because every one of those dollars they conjure out of thin air steals a little bit of value from your savings, your grocery budget, and your future.
We may not be able to stop the Fed from manipulating the money supply, but we can teach the next generation what it's doing, why it matters, and how to protect themselves from it.
One of the best places to start is by teaching your kids the lessons about the economy that most adults don’t even know.
Our Holiday Sale is happening right now, and that makes it the best time to grab The Creature from Jekyll Island (along with the rest of our economics and history resources) that help families make sense of a world that often seems upside-down and backwards.
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Once kids start to understand how money is made and how it is manipulated for gain by the wealthy elite, they become inoculated against the narrative that wealth and prosperity comes from monetary policy or government edict.
Once they learn that the government lies about money, they start to see other ways the truth is twisted and obscured to manipulate everyday people into giving away their freedom, liberty, and prosperity to those who are actually just looking out for themselves and their powerful friends.
That’s the kind of power I want to give my kids, and I suspect you do too.
— Connor
