QE is much more than loans that get paid back. The fed's balance sheet actually went up by 4 trillion dollars during the 2008 recovery [1], even though the loan program was less than 1 trillion. Much of QE finances government debt. But the fed also still holds more than a trillion dollars of mortgage backed securities.

[1] https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttren...

Government debt and MBS are loans that are continuously being paid back.

Yep - and the US government actually MADE money on the MBS it bought.

People who are angry seldom take the time to understand how finance works.

That's 1.9 trillion in MBS on the balance sheet now. It seems like you have counted those eggs before they have hatched! If we could really make money on these we would get them off the balance sheet, but that is proving to be impossible to do.

I guess you could argue that we're making money, but that's only because we get to print money to buy these for free and de-value everyone else's dollars.

It's not really surprising, that the same dumb accounting mistakes that got all these "2B2F" banks in trouble in the first place, are also made by their ardent fans on HN. GP is the same joker who dismisses people as "angry" and "uneducated" elsewhere ITT, but doesn't actually have any idea what happened. Reading Timmy Geithner's book doesn't help...

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/2008...

Do you think the government will get paid back for buying junk bonds from companies likely to go bankrupt?

Bond holders are high on the ladder in terms of who gets paid if a company defaults. For the few companies that do go completely insolvent they will still receive most of the principal back

Yeah, probably. They won't necessarily get all of the principle, but with the equity holders wiped out, there's probably enough to divy up.

When was profitability added to governments' remit?

The government is not chartered to make money, but that's frequently a side effect of lending and equity. You can see the numbers here from the last bailout:

https://projects.propublica.org/bailout/

The government handed out $634B.

The government recouped $390B + $364B = $754B.

So, $120B profit. Again, I'm not saying we should bailout corporations and ignore the little guy. The stimulus checks are critical. But you can't compare them dollar for dollar.

It's not profitability for profitability's sake. It's a positive number on a budget balance sheet. At the end of the day, they have some kind of budget to spend on stuff. The sum of the expenses has to fit the budget. If this comes out as a net positive, they can spend more elsewhere, like on unemployment benefits or schools or whatever else they're planning to need money for in the future.

> The sum of the expenses has to fit the budget.

Is this actually the case? They have a money printer. What’s the problem with using it, as long as inflation stays low?

I mean, I suppose technically seigniorage is part of the budget but then your statement is just a statement of definitions, not an insight.