MSNBC, Released on 10/9/22

The price of goods and these rates are just too high for so many families in the U.S. A new book by financial expert and investigative journalist Nomi Prins, “Permanent Distortion”, sets its sights on the Federal Reserve and does so unflinchingly. Prins argues that the Fed, and its willingness and ability to make lots of money available for so long at such low rates to banks, has created a distortion: wealthy people and corporations benefit directly from the Fed’s long-term willingness to keep rates low, which keeps money flowing to large businesses and stock prices high. After all, why put your money in the bank, as opposed to the stock market when interest rates are so low? But this doesn’t apply to regular working people, many of whom aren’t invested in the stock market and whose livelihoods depend on wages, not cheap bank loans. Prins calls this “distortion,” and says it’s become permanent. Basically, she argues, our financial system has contributed to the creation and maintenance of two Americas: one made up of the mega rich, the other made up of the never rich.

*The interview begins at 02:19

Nomi Prins is an American author, journalist, and Senior Fellow at Demos. She has worked as a managing director at Goldman-Sachs and as a Senior Managing Director at Bear Stearns, as well as having worked as a senior strategist at Lehman Brothers and analyst at the Chase Manhattan Bank. Prins is known for her books All the Presidents’ Bankers: The Hidden Alliances that Drive American Power, Collusion: How Central Bankers Rigged the World and Permanent Distortion: How the Financial Markets Abandoned the Real Economy Forever.

  distortion, economy, Fed