Karl Marx wrote about the way capitalism supposedly led to the “immiseration” of the proletariat. That was entirely mistaken, but in this Independent Review article, professor Robert Higgs writes about how the federal government’s policy of keeping interest rates at extraordinarily low levels has been “immiserating” older Americans who depend on interest earnings.
Here’s the trade-off: the federal government is able to keep borrowing prodigious amounts for its wasteful spending while older people who thought they could live decently on savings have to tighten their belts or continue working. Alas, the harm done by bad government policy is often suffered quietly by the “little guys” our compassionate politicians always claim to care about.
