QE1 worked well and the banks are not corrupt. It's in the later years, while stocks and the economy were on a tear, that the Fed at. al. refused to raise interest rates ... this perpetuated the housing bubble among other things, which is the #1 source of inequality (hint, it's not between the billionaires and the rest of us, it's between the propertied and the unpropertied).
QE1 did not work at all. And the Fed's 0 percent interest rates have distorted capital markets causing corporate debt to skyrocket. That alone is propping up zombie companies and this overleverage is what will make the coming recession / depression even worse than 2008. Note: the Fed is violating the Federal Reserve Act by using BlackRock as a proxy for bond purchases. So please do not tell me they are not corrupt. They're beyond corrupt.
This. The 'race to the bottom', committed globally by central banks, to get to 0% interest rates, and keep them there for the sake of keeping the markets 'up', exacerbated by top level politicians' desires/directives.
If there's no cost to borrow, why not keep borrowing? And keep borrowing? And lending? Until things really unwind in a recession/depression that will de-lever everything/everyone.
The moral hazard? I try to maintain my own family finances, keep a budget, save for expensive things. And in the span of 3 weeks the US has spent $7,000 of every individual's future ($2T / 340M people).
> And in the span of 3 weeks the US has spent $7,000 of every individual's future ($2T / 340M people).
You can’t really claim that. The reality in the progressively taxed US is the higher tax brackets pay the overwhelming majority of the total tax bill.
In reality, the payback of that $2T will fall on the top taxpayers. So it’s more like $10 for most Americans and $100000+ for the top percentiles. Bezos types will pay tens of millions.
