You probably won't take it from me but this 'most advanced civilization ever known' was achieved in spite of the fed not because of it.  It is easy to get careless drawing conclusions about cause and effect.  No matter how great you may think things are it is nevertheless true that no good can ever derive from a fundamentally dishonest money system over the long the haul. It is a deal with the devil and the devil eventually gets his due.

 

And don't mistake economic activity for wealth.  Like some guy borrows $10 million and goes into town and starts throwing money around.  Everybody's finances look pretty good until the bills come due.  Inflation surrepticiously funds govt and govt is a pure and insatiable consumer...

 

Take it from the godfather keynes himself -

 

By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.