Housing bubbles are missed, the Eurozone faces contagion, and nothing at all is being done about unemployment.
Not that this is anything new, but what’s frustrating is that no one is being held accountable for anything.
The superior officers of urinating marines, Fed governors, Wall Street financiers: you name ‘em and they’re getting a free pass.
Gorilla says: “When there’s no punishment for being craven, craven becomes the new normal!”
…
Gorilla says: “Yep, it’s the big nothing as usual from a Fed that thinks 9% unemployment is just fine!”
At the Fed this time, where they can’t seem to agree on just how stupid they can be!
Some Fed governors are worried about inflation, although the Fed’s missed the target on the downside for 3 straight years…
Some think inflation would be a good thing, given the Fed’s done absolutely nothing to address its employment mandate…
And what’s needed of course is a clear announcement: An inflation target of 4-5% until unemployment falls below 7%!
Gorilla says: “All we get is dithering, and dithering isn’t hiring!”
While our leaders do nothing!
What’s needed is large scale stimulus (at least $1 trillion/year for the next 2 years) to create a large-scale jobs program (to hire at least 10 million unemployed Americans).
The Fed will try to lower prices on credit, which may have a stimulative effect.
It should, but probably won’t until November, raise the inflation target to at least 4%.
It should also be thinking seriously about directly setting up a means to get money into people’s pockets, without the need for a deadlocked Congress.
But what’s lacking in the economy is demand.
The private sector is sitting on boatloads of cash and has very little incentive to expand, regardless of the cost of credit.
So unemployment will remain high, and could well go higher in the absence of sensible fiscal policy.
The President’s also got to do a lot more. He has very little chance of being reelected in 2012 if the economy remains at or below where it is today.
Deficit reduction should be off the table for at least 2 years.
The Executive Branch should take the TARP money and leverage it into creating an infrastructure bank.
The GSEs should be refinancing underwater mortgages for the millions of homeowners who are still making payments.
These are the things that should be done and do not require Congress.
Gorilla says: “Dysfunction and disaster need not be self-fulfilling prophecies!”
The amount of money given by the Fed to rescue from bankruptcy Wall Street and Europe’s largest banks almost exactly equals the amount of money delinquent and foreclosed American homeowners owe on their mortgages!!!
Gorilla says: “And that number would be $1.2 trillion!!!”
The Fed seems worried about the US arms of Euroland banks.
Helicopter Ben and company want some reassurance that these banks can wall themselves off from their parents’ troubles as the Eurozone contagion continues.
The feeling that there’s nobody in charge in Euroland appears at the moment to be a self-fulfilling prophecy of doom.
The global economy is again stalling out, and policymakers aren’t doing anything but the wrong things to right the ship.
Gorilla says: “And it’s on to QE3, 4, and 5!!!”
Stating the obvious: Interest rates are going nowhere for the foreseeable future. Economic growth revised downwards. 9.1% unemployment.
And the response? Absolutely nothing!!!
Where is the large scale monetary stimulus (at least $2 trillion is needed), given that political leaders will agree on nothing before the 2012 elections?
Where is the unemployment mandate, given that the employment/population ratio has remained unchanged at a disastrously low level for the past 2 years?
Where is the raising of the target inflation rate, given that inflation is much too low?
Where is the free money for people who aren’t bankers?
Where is the housing refinance to help underwater homeowners?
The 2 worst Fed Chairmen of all time:
(Tie) Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke
Gorilla says: “Nothing more to say about these two stupid, cowardly, amoral pygmies!”
M. Trichet, of course, the worst central banker not named Ben Bernanke!!!
As it’s very clear that both Spain and Italy may need massive bailouts, the ECB should be doing the following right away:
1) Announcing they will purchase at least a couple of trillion in Spanish, Italian, Greek, Irish, and Portuguese bonds.
2) Reduce interest rates to 0.25% and announce an inflation target of 5% for the foreseeable future.
3) Prepare the hopeless, lying Euroland politicians for the very likely possibility that the Eurozone will have to break up, if the PIIGS are to have any hope of economic growth.
4) Encourage the same hopeless, lying politicians to undertake large-scale stimulus programs (at least a trillion) to combat unemployment and foster real growth.
But M. Trichet, not content with making the same mistakes he made just 3 years ago, still doesn’t seem to get it.
And Ben Bernanke, who’s been wrong on everything for the past 10 years, still doesn’t seem to get it.
Gorilla says: “We’re heading for a decade or more of complete disaster, so long as they morons are in charge!!!”
Since the Congress and the President have abdicated their responsibilities entirely, it’s long past time for the Fed to do something serious about unemployment.
Quantitative easing has been a mixed bag so far.
It certainly saved the American financial system, but giving only banks and corporations access to free money has not lead to an increase in demand.
Banks are busy speculating, as usual, while corporations are sitting on both record profits and mountains of cash.
The problem with the US economy right now is a lack of demand, primarily caused by the high unemployment and massive deleveraging that resulted from the bursting of the housing bubble.
The output gap’s on the order of $2 trillion, and the number of unemployed is probably close to 25 million.
It may take a decade or more for the US economy to recover if nothing is done.
If employers won’t hire, the Fed needs to step in and create demand.
Fortunately, the Fed has one great tool at its disposal: the ability to print unlimited amounts of money.
The best way to do so would be for Helicopter Ben to announce that the Fed will hire 10 million unemployed Americans at a salary of $30,000/year for the foreseeable future.
The cost of such a program would be $750 billion/year, or roughly the annual Pentagon budget.
While it would obviously be preferable that these Americans engaged in productive labor, the main point is to get them paying taxes, spending money, and staying in their homes.
This could also be coupled with a refinancing by the GSEs or the Fed of every underwater mortgage in America, reducing principal to current market values.
And finally, the Fed should announce that it is raising the target inflation rate to 5% for the forseeable future. A little inflation will go a long way towards getting the deleveraging disaster under control.
None of these steps requires Congressional approval.
It’s clear that the politically gridlocked Congress won’t be doing anything about unemployment until at least 2013, and will be idiotically cutting spending and reducing growth further throughout the next 2 years.
So, the Fed needs to do the heavy lifting of genuine national leadership.
It would also be useful for the Fed to engage in a coordinated inflation target raising with the ECB and the Bank of Japan.
And it would be extremely helpful for the otherwise worthless US Treasury Secretary to announce that the Administration intends to pursue a weak dollar policy.
We can’t address global trade imbalances when the Chinese, Indians, and Brazilians are, like America’s corporations, hoarding money and refusing to let their currencies appreciate.
The austerity and inflation fetishes currently being pursued by the developed world’s central bankers are entirely unnecessary and ultimately self-defeating: contraction is contractionary.
Gorilla says: “All Americans, Europeans, and Japanese need is the confidence and certainty of a regular paycheck, then they’ll take care of the rest!!!”
“Our estimates of growth and inflation have missed completely on the downside for the past 3 years. It may very well be that we were wrong, but we couldn’t possibly comment. So, we’ll not do anything, unless we should, just in case the things we haven’t anticipated suddenly arrive, or things we have anticipated don’t materialize. No, this isn’t a sick joke, because who can afford to risk a laugh in these baffling times?”
