WOW!

As you can see, there’s a lot going on around the Fed. But keep in mind that the whole is really just the sum of the parts.

Basically, the Federal Reserve is made up of three parts: the Board of Governors—that’s the building on the far left; the Reserve banks—the 12 buildings along the right; and the Federal Open Market Committee—a powerful group that meets in the room sticking out from the Board of Governors. The complex design of these three parts is actually tied to how the Fed was created in the first place.

To understand this structure better, let’s first step back about a hundred years.