Questions about Sweden

[Nettles]

Puppyroach said:

Nettles said:

Negative interest rates themself are irresponsible no?
Why punish savers and retirees who must now pay the banks in order to keep their money in there?
These ultra low and negative rates are what caused the big housing bubble, it's the same here in Australia.
There is no escaping this economic mess without severe recession/depression.Endgame is hyperinflation.We will see how strong your society is.

That's not how it automatically works. The purpose of the national negative interest (called Repo interest) is to kick start the economy by growing consumption. It is right that it might create a housing bubble, but this is offset by the banks now demanding that you cover atleast 15-20% of the price for a new house yourself in order to even be eligible to buy. The government is also looking into forcing those who take loans to start paying them off from the start.

The savings interest is not automatically on the negative side just because Repo interest is. At the moment I think the average interest at the banks is something like 0.5% and i actually don't even think any bank has negative savings interest. The banks don't want to have negative rates on savings and likely make up some of their losses through other fees and such. And the banks are doing quite well at the moment.

The banks want negative interest on savings but cannot do it without a cashless society.With cash still in the system you can withdraw and thus avoid negative rates.Sweden is ver far along with this cashless society model, they may be the first to bring negative rates on savings in.

Here's a Bank of England economist calling for both negative interest rates and a ban on cash : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/bank-of-england/11874061/Negative-interest-rates-could-be-necessary-to-protect-UK-economy-says-Bank-of-England-chief-economist.html

Heaps more articles like this out there let me know if you want me to link more.