Well, ND's not entirely on its own: Puerto Rico also has an independent state-owned bank, as a small 's' state in its status of "freely associated state" (estado libre asociado), rather than a State of the Union. And we also don't have a mortgage crisis, because subprime mortgages and other innovations weren't allowed by our state-owned central bank either. You might want to shoot me for a lame attempt at "synchronising" the chorus with The Wizard of Oz, but I'm just the messenger for that banking system allegory of others: most recently Ellen Brown, Esquiress, in her book Web of Debt. At her website she advocates that other states emulate North Dakota in depositing all tax revenues, as well as withholding those that would go to Washington, in a state-run bank, which could then declare them as reserves from which to lend out 10x as much for local development. Public Banking