What we are getting is downloadable shadow banking.

A public option, but for banking.

That’s what Reps. Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are proposing in a new bill unveiled on Friday.

The Public Banking Act, first shared with Vox, wouldn’t create those options by itself, but would foster the creation of public banks across the country by providing them a pathway to getting started, establishing an infrastructure for liquidity and credit facilities for them via the Federal Reserve, and setting up federal guidelines for them to be regulated. Essentially, it would make it easier for public banks to exist, and it would give some of them grant money to get started.

Then the zinger:

The intent of the proposal is to try to guarantee a more equitable recovery by providing an alternative to Wall Street banks for state and local governments, businesses, and ordinary people, and by ensuring such banks provide services to historically excluded and marginalized groups. The public banking bill also does double duty as a climate bill: It would prohibit public banks from investing in or doing business with the fossil fuel industry.

Aways the catch, and many more catches in side the bill I am sure.

But the big problem is that a public bank is a smart phone app these days. If the bill passes, the governor of Wyoming will have downloadable apps for his generic ledger servers. Likely a very good thing. But it indicates the issue, a public bank bill by itself is a whisper in a technology hurricane.

“It’s not that tomorrow you’re going to see 1,000 of these across the country; it’s still going to be a hill-by-hill, city-by-city battle,” Grey said.

We are getting a thousand of internet banks, most of them in place today or soon to be formed. But they are still a bit primitive running on V1 of Eth contracts.  But V2 allows much simpler proof of stake and faster response.