Fed program meant to help workers amid pandemic prioritized Wall Street investors instead: analysis

[CousinIT]

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/09/fed-program-meant-to-help-workers-amid-prioritized-wall-street-investors-instead-analysis/#.X2vIpsq5uRA.twitter

A new analysis out Wednesday reveals that the Federal Reserve bond purchasing program meant to prevent workers from losing their jobs amid the Covid-19 pandemic instead bolstered companies who laid off more than one million workers while paying massive dividends to shareholders—a finding escalating concerns that the central bank’s behavior is “contributing to an economic recovery that benefits wealthy executives and investors but leaves behind American workers.”

The report put forth by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis —titled “Prioritizing Wall Street” (pdf)—examines individual corporate bonds purchased through the Fed’s Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility (SMCCF), a lending system supported by funds from the CARES Act but which lacks taxpayer and worker protections included in other programs backed by the legislation passed earlier this year.

For corporations hoping to become eligible to issue bonds purchased by the Fed, the SMCCF “imposes no conditions requiring companies to save jobs or limit payments to executives or shareholders,” the report notes.

The central bank has purchased corporate bonds issued by approximately 500 large companies since June. Subcommittee staff compared those transactions to public data on layoffs, dividend payouts, and illegal conduct.

[Wellstone ruled]

1. Surprise surprise!

Most people knew this was the real story.

[Sherman A1]

4. +!

[crickets]

2. Without protections and oversight, this is the kind of thing that happens.

Every time. It will happen every single time.

[sprinkleeninow]

3. Mais bien sur. But of course they did and will continue to do. eom