Wall Street is not Main Street!

Since 2007, the Federal Reserve System has monetized $2 trillion of debt, mostly toxic loans acquired from Wall Street; and the federal government has borrowed $7 trillion to cover its deficits.  What has all this credit given “Main Street?”  Absolutely nothing!  To make matters worse, real estate values have plummeted at least 40% in many areas of the country.  However, such credit has kept solvent those so-called “To Big To Fail Banks” on the backs of  “Main Street” folks.  That would be you, innocent savers and taxpayers.  (See the following table to determine if you are better off today than at the end of 2007.)

	December 2007	July 2012	% Change
Federal Gross Debt	$9.229 Trillion	$15.502 Trillion	+167%
Federal Reserve Credit	$871.633 Billion	$2.846 Trillion	+327%
Excess Reserves of Commercial Banks	$1.784 Trillion	$1,483.2 Trillion	+831%
Case-Shiller (20 City) Home Price Index	184.97	142.21	-23.1%
New One Family Houses Sold	619,000	372,000	-40%
All Employees, Total Non-Farm	138,873,000	132,868,000	-4.3%
S&P 500	1468.36	1411.13	-3.9%

Source: FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Economic Data)