If you save anything in modern America, you are an absolute fool. For years, the Federal Reserve Bank has set interest rates well below “natural” levels. (In a free lending market, private banks would tend to charge substantially more interest per dollar lent, and savers could expect substantially higher rates of return for keeping their savings with banks.)
Since the economic recession of 2008, the Federal Reserve has set interest rates at near zero. (Interest rates were already well below natural rates.) This is a powerful incentive to borrow, and a very powerful incentive NOT to save. On February 24, 2015, Fed Chair Janet Yellen announced that the Central Bank would not be hiking rates for the next couple quarters.
In practice, zero-percent interest rates mean that it COSTS BANKS MONEY TO HOLD PEOPLES’ SAVINGS. On the same day the Fed announced it would not raise interest rates, J.P. Morgan bank announced it will start charging its big clients to keep their money in savings.
Savers who keep their money in banks will increasingly find that those banks will CHARGE them fees rather than PAY any interest.
