(to the music of Beatles ‘The Taxman’)
On the lighter side, I was recently asked by a twitter friend why the US stock market is at record high levels and now more than fully recovered from its lows in March. I explained it was because the Fed so far this year has pumped this more than $7 trillion into investors, bankers, and big corporations, who then conveniently diverted most of that ‘free money’ into financial markets, driving up stock price values to current record levels.
The Fed’s $7 trillion breaks down thus:
+ $3.2T of QE bond buying from the Fed so far this year (including $120B more each month for Nov.-Dec.)
+ $1.5T more the Fed pumped into Repo markets for banks and shadow banks this past year
+ $2T in corporations’ issuing new corporate bonds at super low interest rates since February, made possible by the Fed reducing interest rates to near zero
+ $300B in corporations borrowing down their credit lines at banks due to Fed enabled super low rates.
That’s $7.0 trillion, compared to the $.5T that small businesses got in PPP loans and $.5T workers got in unemployment benefits and checks from the Cares Act in March which is now totally expired.
That ‘$7 for you and $1 for me’ reminded me of the 1960s Beatles Song, ‘The Taxman’–a period when the rich actually were taxed at least a little, unlike today, when Fed rates were always more than 5%, and there was no such thing as QE. The US alone has reduced investor-business taxes by $15 Trillion since 2001, including Trump’s 2018 tax cuts costing more than $4T. Then there’s another $650B in taxes that were cut just this past March in the Cares Act as well. QE and low rates have been the norm since at least 2009.
By the way, $15T in tax cuts since 2001 would reduce the federal debt almost exactly back to its $4T level in 2000. Federal Reserve bank monetary policies and the $15T tax cuts for business fiscal policies since 2001 together account not only for most of the US federal government’s roughly $20T debt before 2020, but also account for 3/4s of the escalation in income inequality in the USA since 2000.
So to illustrate the Fed’s role in providing ever increasing amounts of virtually free money to bankers & investors in order to pump up financial markets, I re-wrote the lyrics to ‘The Taxman’ song below and renamed the song, ‘The Fed Man’.
The new lyrics go like this (using the Beatles’ Tax Man musical score).
THE FED MAN
“One Two Three Four One Two….
“Let me tell you how it will be
No money for you, for them it’s free
‘Cause I’m the Fed Man, yeah, I’m the Fed Man
Should your bailout appear too small
Be thankful or you get nothing at all
‘Cause I’m the Fed Man, yeah, I’m the Fed Man
If you own a Bank, the money is free
If you own a Fund, whatever you need
If you own a Bond, I’ll guarantee
If you want more Stock, come see me
‘Cause I’m the Fed Man, yeah, I’m the Fed Man
Don’t ask me why I give them more
Just go and vote, we own the store
I’m the Fed Man, yeah, I’m the Fed Man
The post The Fed Man Song appeared first on CounterPunch.org.
Print
Jack Rasmus | Radio Free (2020-11-19T06:57:05+00:00) The Fed Man Song. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2020/11/19/the-fed-man-song/
Please log in to upload a file.
There are no updates yet.
Click the Upload button above to add an update.