Yesterday I said "Or perhaps, optimistically, the Fed can keep its balance sheet large indefinitely and we are moving from a global economy addicted to credit to one of addiction management by the Fed."
Brent supplied this good link in a response:
09/21/2013 10:09
Re: Fed balance sheet c.f.
http://www.voxeu.org/article/exit-path-implications-collateral-chains
Re: "Why is monetization limited to supporting the assets of the wealthy?"
I
think that line of questioning leads to Congress. If you regard Fed purchases of U.S. TBonds and TBills as monetization, then the Fed is already supporting much of the expenditures of the U.S. federal government. (Limiting what the Fed buys maintains legislative oversight over the marshaling of real resources.) See also: Modern Monetary Theory, Guaranteed Minimum Income, Social Credit....
Yes Brent I do blame congress, specifically Tea Party Republicans, and more broadly Republicans, with the least amount of blame going to democrats (but they are not guilt free). But from a practical standpoint the Fed 's policies are allowing (and promoting) the Tea Party and the Republicans to get away with insane behaviour. (Behaviour which I have repeatedly denounced on these pages) This will make dealing with long term imbalances a lot more painful and challenging when addressing them can no longer be deferred (unless they can kick the can so far down the road that AD will be wind at their backs- my belief is that this will be highly unlikely -that given rising inequality (continually downward adjusting of wages to reach productivity levels commensurate with China). Less love from the Fed to the elites would be a prescription that would hurt in the US Economy in short run but would promote reform, reduce crony capitalism, increase the chance of meaningful personal and corporate tax reform and incentivize policy makers to pass reforms that would improve the long run viability of the US economy.
As I have said repeatedly moral hazard seems to be something we worry about in economics and business only when it doesn't apply to the elites.
Finally, yes I do think that the Fed is monetizing the expenditures of the Federal Government, despite claims by Warren Buffet that they are the greatest hedge fund in history. Buffet points out they returned "It’s generating “$80 billion or $90 billion a year probably” in revenue for the U.S. government, he said. “And that wasn’t the case a few years back.”"
I want to see what the 10-15 CAGR of the Fed's bond portfolio will be. If they end up losing money then these purchases will in effect be monetization. I suspect this will be the case and it will have been done principally to prop up the elites as pointed out by Izzy above.
As I said in this post
To me the world economy looks like an episode of "Intervention". The Fed is playing the role of codependent parent handing out money to addicted (elite) children.
Brent supplied this good link in a response:
09/21/2013 10:09
Re: Fed balance sheet c.f.
http://www.voxeu.org/article/exit-path-implications-collateral-chains
Re: "Why is monetization limited to supporting the assets of the wealthy?"
I
think that line of questioning leads to Congress. If you regard Fed purchases of U.S. TBonds and TBills as monetization, then the Fed is already supporting much of the expenditures of the U.S. federal government. (Limiting what the Fed buys maintains legislative oversight over the marshaling of real resources.) See also: Modern Monetary Theory, Guaranteed Minimum Income, Social Credit....
Yes Brent I do blame congress, specifically Tea Party Republicans, and more broadly Republicans, with the least amount of blame going to democrats (but they are not guilt free). But from a practical standpoint the Fed 's policies are allowing (and promoting) the Tea Party and the Republicans to get away with insane behaviour. (Behaviour which I have repeatedly denounced on these pages) This will make dealing with long term imbalances a lot more painful and challenging when addressing them can no longer be deferred (unless they can kick the can so far down the road that AD will be wind at their backs- my belief is that this will be highly unlikely -that given rising inequality (continually downward adjusting of wages to reach productivity levels commensurate with China). Less love from the Fed to the elites would be a prescription that would hurt in the US Economy in short run but would promote reform, reduce crony capitalism, increase the chance of meaningful personal and corporate tax reform and incentivize policy makers to pass reforms that would improve the long run viability of the US economy.
As I have said repeatedly moral hazard seems to be something we worry about in economics and business only when it doesn't apply to the elites.
Finally, yes I do think that the Fed is monetizing the expenditures of the Federal Government, despite claims by Warren Buffet that they are the greatest hedge fund in history. Buffet points out they returned "It’s generating “$80 billion or $90 billion a year probably” in revenue for the U.S. government, he said. “And that wasn’t the case a few years back.”"
I want to see what the 10-15 CAGR of the Fed's bond portfolio will be. If they end up losing money then these purchases will in effect be monetization. I suspect this will be the case and it will have been done principally to prop up the elites as pointed out by Izzy above.
As I said in this post
To me the world economy looks like an episode of "Intervention". The Fed is playing the role of codependent parent handing out money to addicted (elite) children.
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