The trouble is, creating money electronically or with a printing press, which is what central banks do, is counterfeiting. Bank counterfeiting, which is another name for inflation, fuels a great many evils for which it gets little credit, such as wars and depressions. Besides being a check on bank counterfeiting, or inflation, gold is also a serious restriction on government expansion. Fortunately for American bankers and their political allies, Europe provided examples of ingenious solutions to the dilemma of bank counterfeiting. Thus, the American central bank became known as the Federal Reserve System, or the Fed.