During QE, the Federal Reserve bought huge amounts of toxic assets from the big banks, and flooded the banks' accounts with new money, but then paid the banks a

During QE, the Federal Reserve bought huge amounts of toxic assets from the big banks, and flooded the banks' accounts with new money, but then paid the banks a higher rate of interest NOT to lend that money out (at least this is my understanding). That's a contributor to the slow "recovery" (which is really just slowly reinflating the credit bubble). The reason they would do this is to prevent high inflation from the massive increase in the monetary base. Effectively, QE just made the big banks balance sheets show "Red == Black" by having the Fed take the red onto itself. So, normally you would be correct about the point of low interest, but in this new world, post-QE, low interest rates are really just there to keep the economy limping along by hiding the massive structural issues, instead of encouraging credit growth. That's why the whole narrative about the Fed heroically saving the economy after 2008 crisis is pretty much nonsense, IMO. The problem still exists and it's worse than ever. Who knows what the next can-kicking solution will be, if there even is one?