[quote=FlyerInHi][quote=CA renter]
No, I’m sorry brian, but the *type* of growth does matter. And if it’s the government’s job to protect and improve our standard of living why are so many people worse off today than they were ~30+ years ago, before TRILLIONS of dollars have been pushed into the system in order to manipulate things one way or another. [/quote]
You have to distinguish between the Federal Reserve and the Federal government.
The Fed acts through banks to adjust the money supply to economic conditions.
The Federal government has the power to affect GDP distribution.
When the Fed acts alone and provides liquidity, a lot of that is invested abroad for higher returns(good for pension plans). That improves standards of living worldwide. In fact world standard of living keeps on improving.
US GDP and world GDP are standard measures of well-being as imperfect as they may be. First priority, we need to maintain GDP growth. Then there are other ways to improve standard of living that require government coordination.[/quote]
They work in concert. There is no central bank independence.
The surplus money is being used for speculation, it’s not being invested as much in productive ventures that will benefit society, either here or abroad.
Selling existing assets (or their derivatives) back and forth at ever-higher prices is NOT productive. Hoarding commodities and keeping them off the market in order to extract the highest possible gains is NOT productive. Betting on currency moves is NOT productive.
Yes, the govt could be doing things that would help to allocate some of this money to more productive uses, but they are owned by the speculators. The government does not work for the vast majority of US citizens/workers.
