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Central banks and central bankers don't work for free. How much is spent on normal banking infrastructure, cash security vans, fraud protection etc.

• penny500 14y ago
  That's not how quantitative easing works. Quantitative easing doesn't fire up the printing presses. Bernanke can add $2 trillion into the system within 15 minutes, and no paper money is printed or manpower expensed aside from a few clicks on a computer mouse. Once you secure your financial system network, adding currency adds virtually no costs relative to the amount of currency you put into that system. You've already secured the network. It's akin to Facebook's security system. It works the same regardless if it's 100 million users or 1 billion users.
  • kirian 14y ago
    My point is that fiat money systems have costs associated with them. I'm not arguing that the costs change if there is Quantitative easing or not.
  • parasubvert 14y ago
    $2 trillion in 15 minutes might be a wee bit of an exaggeration... considering the monetary base needs to, um, actually buy something, usually Treasury Bills. Which are managed by whole swath of administrators in the Dept of the Treasury (and could lead to printing presses -- for the T-Bills, anyway), as they're usually issued in bond series, etc.