Earlier today, we explained why so-called “helicopter money” can’t save the world when ZIRP, NIRP, and QE have all failed to revive global demand and boost inflation.

The reason: QE is helicopter money. That is, we’ve been doing this for 8 years and it hasn’t worked yet. 

Some readers were reluctant to buy this rationale, but the fact is, just because the bank intermediary failed to do its part for Main Street doesn’t thereby mean this entire experiment isn’t still a farce. Think about the mechanics of it: 1) the government prints a liability (a bond), 2) that liability is sold to a primary dealer, 3) the central bank buys that government liability with yet another liability (dollars) that the government also prints.

That’s a scam. It’s deficit financing with one (very tenuous) degree of separation. The fact that the middlemen (the banks) didn’t pass along the benefits to you doesn’t make the mechanics of it any less ridiculous.

But if that’s helicopter money “v.1,” Main Street thinks it didn’t work out so well. Banks recovered, Jamie Dimon and Lloyd Blankfein became billionaires, financial assets soared, and everyday people got....continue reading HERE