The End of the Housing Bust and more Quantitative Easing

NPR's Planet Money had an excellent podcast about the End of the Housing Bust (say whaaaaa?!).



They have also translated the Fed's announcement of more Quantitative Easing...

The economy still sucks. People are spending a little bit more, but they're stretched thin: One in 10 workers can't find a job, wages are basically flat, home prices are way down and nobody can get a loan. Companies are buying more stuff, for now, but they're not building new factories or offices. Nobody's hiring. Nobody's building. Inflation has gone from low to super low.

The Fed has two main jobs: Keep unemployment low and prices stable. At the moment, as you may have heard, unemployment is really high. And inflation is so low that it's making us nervous. We keep saying that unemployment's going to fall. And it keeps not falling.

So to give the economy a kick in the ass—and to pump up inflation a little bit—we decided to go on a shopping spree. First of all, we're going to keep buying new stuff when our old investments pay off. Second—and this is the big news for today—we're going to create $600 billion out of thin air and use it over the next eight months to buy bonds from the federal government. We hope this will make interest rates go so low that people will borrow and spend more money, and companies will start hiring. By the way, this is an experiment, and we don't really know how it's going to work out. We reserve the right to change our plans at any time.