The world’s banker, the Federal Reserve Board, just reduced interest rates by ¼ of one percent. Every comment I see deals with how low we can get these rates to benefit borrowers. No one seems to have anything to say about savers, those people who have prudently managed their affairs as to have money set aside for their golden years. For almost 15 years the market barely paid them 1 % on their certificates of deposit while giving the difference to borrowers in the form of cheap mortgages, credit cards and car loans. This went on so long that even financial institutions decided it was permanent and bought long term bonds with short term money. When this bet turned into disaster as rates rose, some of them failed and others were merged out with stockholders losing everything. However, savers finally began to get some return on their certificates of deposit that could be used to pay for nursing homes along with trying to stay independent.
As Matt Damon said in Rounders “when you look around the table and can’t tell who the sucker is, it’s you”. Well savers are on the road to be taken advantage again but as I’ve seen before in the 1980’s in Texas and the 2007 housing implosion, having some savings is mighty handy when everybody else is dealing with debts they can’t pay.
