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Last week, the Federal Reserve responded to Wall Street’s coronavirus panic with an “emergency” interest rate cut. This emergency cut failed to revive the stock market, leading to predictions that the Fed will again cut rates later this month. More rate cuts would drive interest rates to near, or even below, zero. Lowering interest rates punishes

Stocks fell last week following news that the yield curve on Treasury notes had inverted. This means that a short-term Treasury note was paying higher interest rates than long-term Treasury note. An inverted yield curve is widely seen as a sign of an impending recession. Some economic commentators reacted to the inverted yield curve by parroting

The US Constitution never granted the federal government authority to create a central bank. The Founders, having lived through hyperinflation themselves, understood that government should never have a printing press at its disposal. But from the very beginning of America’s founding, the desire for a crony central bank was strong. In fact, two

President Trump and his secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, told us the US had to assassinate Major General Qassim Soleimani last week because he was planning “imminent attacks” on US citizens. I don’t believe them. Why not? Because Trump and the neocons — like Pompeo — have been lying about Iran for the past three years in an effort to whip up

President Trump’s decision earlier this month to assassinate Iran’s top military general on Iraqi soil — over the objection of the Iraqi government — has damaged the US relationship with its “ally” Iraq and set the region on the brink of war. Iran’s measured response — a few missiles fired on an Iraqi base after advance warning was given — is the

September 17, 2019 was a significant day in American economic history. On that day, the New York Federal Reserve began emergency cash infusions into the repurchasing (repo) market. This is the market banks use to make short-term loans to each other. The New York Fed acted after interest rates in the repo market rose to almost 10 percent, well

Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article. In my first week in the House of Representatives in 1976, I cast one of the two votes against legislation appropriating funds for a swine flu vaccination program. A swine flu outbreak was then dominating headlines, so most in DC were frantic to “do something” about the virus. Unfortunately,

From California to New Jersey, Americans are protesting in the streets. They are demanding an end to house arrest orders given by government officials over a virus outbreak that even according to the latest US government numbers will claim fewer lives than the seasonal flu outbreak of 2017–18. Across the US, millions of businesses have been shut

House financial services chair Maxine Waters and Senator Elizabeth Warren have introduced the Federal Reserve Racial and Economic Equity Act. This legislation directs the Federal Reserve to eliminate racial disparities in income, employment, wealth, and access to credit. Eliminating racial disparities in access to credit is code for forcing banks

In a sign that the Federal Reserve is growing increasingly desperate to jump-start the economy, the Fed’s Secondary Market Credit Facility has begun purchasing individual corporate bonds. The Secondary Market Credit Facility was created by Congress as part of a coronavirus stimulus bill to purchase as much as $750 billion of corporate credit.