That's not exactly right, to put it mildly. The Fed provides a mechanism to the market to create money by borrowing from the Fed, and repaying at interest. Ent

That's not exactly right, to put it mildly. The Fed provides a mechanism to the market to create money by borrowing from the Fed, and repaying at interest. Entities allowed to borrow from the Fed (banks) are strictly regulated. If they think they can make money by investing what they borrow, and it stays within the strict capitalization laws, then they borrow. That grows the money supply. So the Fed doesn't actually "print money". It provides a mechanism for the money supply itself to grow, based on market demand. The prime lending rate sets the cost of that growth - if the economy is growing too fast (too much demand), they increase the prime, increasing the cost to banks and limiting growth. If the economy is shrinking, they reduce the prime, making it cheaper for banks to lend money (and businesses to borrow), stimulating the economy. Economic growth is simply an increase in production relative to inflation. High inflation hurts growth (by eating into profit). Deflation (negative inflation) hurts growth by making it profitable to simply stuff money in a mattress rather than investing. Economists long ago figured out that low but positive inflation is the right place to be. The Fed manipulates the prime to try to keep things there. Questioning the "ethics" of this is questioning the ethics of the very concept of a free market.