Joe Biden s Train-Wreck Economy – WSJ

What Americans are going through now isn t just another turn in the business cycle. Since 2009, the Federal Reserve has kept interest rates close to zero, an unprecedentedly long era of cheap debt. Ultimately, it gave birth to cryptomania and large investments in digital avatars.

We ll never know whether an economy floating on the Fed s soap bubbles could have run like this indefinitely because a black-swan event showed up as the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020.

Two years and trillions in federal stimulus spending later, the U.S. has a rate of inflation 8.3% not seen since the 1970s, intractable supply-chain problems, the phenomenon of some companies inflating wages to attract workers while others plan layoffs, and stock-market volatility that is ruining 401(k) retirement plans and turning the financial industry s best minds to mush.

via www.wsj.com