The statistics released yesterday by the Bank of England show that quantitative easing has done little more than cause the economy to bump along the bottom or stop things getting worse. Moreover it has boosted asset prices, helping the wealthiest 5% of the population disproportionately to the rest. Not only does the current use of QE fail to stimulate growth in key areas, but it produces a skewed financial outcome which will shock all those who saw value in the post WWII social consensus. Moreover by keeping interest rates artificially low it hurts savers and encourages growth through borrowing, both of which inhibit the prospects for a sound recovery.
Yesterday’s post discussed a different use of QE and it is worth repeating. The newly created money should go straight into economic regeneration via infrastructure development, public house building, school renewal, transport modernisation etc, to create new jobs and wealth without increasing borrowing. Moreover start up funds for neighbourhood industries are essential, to cut the ignored but vast trade gap. Using QE this way will boost economic growth for sure and assets will grow in value commensurate with rising profitability.
House prices and rents will be stabilised by massive public house building of up to a million affordable homes, while benefit costs will fall as we draw back towards the old idea of full employment. Tax revenues will rocket. This will first reduce, then extinguish the deficit and push GB back into a budget surplus. The present use of QE is achieving more or less the opposite of all this. Boosting asset prices by printing money, but failing to generate significant growth of GDP and the real worth of the economy, is the road to something awful and nothing like the recovery everyone hopes for.