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This wouldn't matter if we had negative interest rates, but since since we have that immoral zero lower bound that capitalists love so much, we must endlessly w
by imtringued 2y ago
This wouldn't matter if we had negative interest rates, but since since we have that immoral zero lower bound that capitalists love so much, we must endlessly walk down the inflation and debt treadmill.
I don't know why it is so hard to understand. A price control acting as a lower bound on prices will result in the overprovisioning of that good. In the case of money, it means people hold onto more money than is optimal, which in turns creates a recycling problem. The government must pay the difference between the interest rate on the capital markets, which used to be negative and the government guaranteed rate of zero. This difference forces the government to take on more debt. Now that we are in an inflationary situation, the interest rate can be increased and the government is, paradoxically, getting rid of its debts since it no longer has to subsidize the difference.
If people accepted the reality of negative interest, then almost every country could follow a Swiss style hard money monetary policy.
Before you argue that negative interest is some kind of "financial repression", consider that the real interest rate could still be positive even if the nominal interest rate is negative or that negative interest would primarily exist intermittently during recessions to restabilize the economy without deficit spending.