This is a follow-up to my subscriber post from earlier today on the US economy. For those of you who are not paying subscribers, let me summarize the post by saying I think the US economy is slowing but not in a recession. Nevertheless, I think we are likely to see a recession before the end of 2020. That's actually my base case.
I could be wrong, but...it seems that there are 2 types of debt to consider. One is the household, where mortgages are the most important kind of debt. The other is business debt, where corporations are the most important class, especially in the eyes of policy makers. I don't know if corporate debt is as worrisome today as it was a few years ago, but if it is, then this seems to be the likely target of rate cuts.
Interest on excess reserves, if still as high as they were earlier in the year, would prevent banks from lending if the federal funds rate went below IOER.
One thing that is striking is that here we are talking about lower interest rates promoting consumption instead of investment, which is where we would rather be. Do earned incomes for the population ever figure into investment decisions? And earning interest is actually extractive to the economy, since the money supply in aggregate doesn't contain interest, only principal.
I could be wrong, but...it seems that there are 2 types of debt to consider. One is the household, where mortgages are the most important kind of debt. The other is business debt, where corporations are the most important class, especially in the eyes of policy makers. I don't know if corporate debt is as worrisome today as it was a few years ago, but if it is, then this seems to be the likely target of rate cuts.
Interest on excess reserves, if still as high as they were earlier in the year, would prevent banks from lending if the federal funds rate went below IOER.
One thing that is striking is that here we are talking about lower interest rates promoting consumption instead of investment, which is where we would rather be. Do earned incomes for the population ever figure into investment decisions? And earning interest is actually extractive to the economy, since the money supply in aggregate doesn't contain interest, only principal.