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Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

washingtonpost.com

171–180 of 319 posts

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if stocks dropping was mostly due to people selling their holdings?

With interest rate at near 0 percent and inflation at 2.3%, people will come back to stocks sooner rather than later

Why? I would rather hold cash that gives me 0% return (or -2.3%) rather than something that is going to return less than 30% a year.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game over happens when, fiat money seems to have, on a risk adjusted, liquidity adjusted basis, a better return and better appeal than holding existing real private assets, therefore a process starts where people, businesses and banks try to hoard government paper all at the same time instead of holding private assets. Demand shifts so far towards government paper and away from private assets that the supply of the l…

> Game over happens when, fiat money seems to have, on a risk adjusted, liquidity adjusted basis, a better return and better appeal than holding existing real private assets, therefore a process starts where people, businesses and banks try to hoard government paper all at the same time instead of holding private assets. This is what happened in the 1930s. But as you say, counteracting it is as easy as printing money…

It will be used to monetise government debt. You will see targeted fiscal action announced tomorrow, to the tune of perhaps a hundred billion or more, aiming to help the businesses (and employees of those businesses) that are (and will be) decimated by the freeze in economic activity, and the crash in demand.

From the announcement on Friday it sounded like the financial aid to companies that need it will be distributed through IRS as tax credits, or directly as cash to those companies with cash flow issues. I don't know how they aim to decide which companies qualify for the aid.

There will be several similar fiscal stimulus measures announced over the coming weeks, perhaps even bailouts.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#174
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sort of surprised they didn't try to push the issue from the bottom. give every tax filer some amount of money say, $200. A bonus for each dependent, say, $100. pulled numbers absolutely out of thin air. I thought the issue was money sloshing around at the bottom, a couple hundred bucks can be a big deal when you're out of work. Ah well, I'm sure the experts have it well in hand.

It's called helicopter money. Australia and Hong Kong already announced going down this route. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_money It is very last measure as in that point you are basically admitting that capitalism has failed.

Alberta did this with a surplus once. It was great. It doesn’t need to be a last resort at all

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Closing down schools, banning large gatherings, setting up drive thru testing, ramping up test kits next week, letting employees to work from home, closing borders to China and Europe (25k cases), etc

Does that stuff help? Did Italy do that? Im seeing tons of people on IG using this time as a means to take vacations.

Yes, it helps. China had Hubei province on lockdown for the last couple months and that's a big reason that they have been able to control the spread.

Italy should not be looked to as a model of how to handle this.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#176
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sort of surprised they didn't try to push the issue from the bottom. give every tax filer some amount of money say, $200. A bonus for each dependent, say, $100. pulled numbers absolutely out of thin air. I thought the issue was money sloshing around at the bottom, a couple hundred bucks can be a big deal when you're out of work. Ah well, I'm sure the experts have it well in hand.

It's called helicopter money. Australia and Hong Kong already announced going down this route. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_money It is very last measure as in that point you are basically admitting that capitalism has failed.

Assuming that tax isn’t a failure of capitalism, how is a negative tax a failure of capitalism?

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#177
post #142
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much of the tax avoidance from primary residence property has been removed from the tax code already due to the TCJA. Not all of it, but most of it. It also makes no sense to have a mortgage for the tax break. Rentals have depreciation and the interest remains deductible as an expense on them there, so that isn't really an issue.

Regarding tax avoidance from primary residence, what specifically? I can still deduct mortgage interest. Are you talking about not itemizing some home ownership expenses (like what?) because standard deduction increase? Just wondering what I’m missing..

You can't deduct it with the new larger standard personal deduction, only if you itemize. The Trump tax bill was a reform made the mortgage deduction moot for about 20 million taxpayers.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#178
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sort of surprised they didn't try to push the issue from the bottom. give every tax filer some amount of money say, $200. A bonus for each dependent, say, $100. pulled numbers absolutely out of thin air. I thought the issue was money sloshing around at the bottom, a couple hundred bucks can be a big deal when you're out of work. Ah well, I'm sure the experts have it well in hand.

It's called helicopter money. Australia and Hong Kong already announced going down this route. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_money It is very last measure as in that point you are basically admitting that capitalism has failed.

Quantitative easing is NOT helicopter money. HK is the first country that actually tried something like Helicopter money. 1500 US$ for each citizen.

All the quantitative easing has just brought us a giant bubble via asset price inflation. All I know, the bigger the bubble, the louder the blob. If central banks should do something, than finance entrepreneurship and start-ups, bring money to the people.

"It is very last measure as in that point you are basically admitting that capitalism has failed."

No, it has not. The boom-bust cycle is a feature of capitalism. Capitalism, call it a ponzi driven debt scheme, will only fail, if no further economic growth is possible anymore. This may be caused by energy limitations (wealth and growth are linked to Energy available) or other limiting things. Trust me, you don't want to go there. Some people call it seneca cliff.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fed rate is the interest rates that the Fed pays banks for their deposits in the Fed. By lowering it, they’re incentivizing the banks to loan the money and provide liquidity into the market. Since banks need to make a profit on everything, they’ll loan the money out at a higher rate for things like mortgage, car loans, and credit cards. Depending on the credit worthiness and the collateral, the rates will differ…

You'll never get zero on _some_ products. Retailers utilize low interest rates to provide "direct" financing to incentivize purchases at their stores. This is often provided as a "promotional"[1][2] rate with the hope that it will spur purchasing in the short term and then make money on the financing in a longer timeline. Often this is done at stores which sell "durable goods" (e.g. appliances or automobiles). The ta…

That's kind of outside of the topic of finance though. Subsidized car loans are just as relevant to the financial markets as free samples at Costco are relevant to agriculture prices.

Re: Federal Reserve slashes interest rates to zero

#180
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the Fed loses this fight, game over. This isn't the Fed's fight. Monetary policy won't fix this.

I'm sort of surprised they didn't try to push the issue from the bottom. give every tax filer some amount of money say, $200. A bonus for each dependent, say, $100. pulled numbers absolutely out of thin air. I thought the issue was money sloshing around at the bottom, a couple hundred bucks can be a big deal when you're out of work. Ah well, I'm sure the experts have it well in hand.

The fed can’t do that. The legislative would need to.
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