Except the banks payed it back. The US government profited about $15bn from the bailouts. Potentially a loss if considering inflation. Also banks were forced to take the bailouts to prevent a bank run. You would almost certainly have taken your money out of CITI bank if they were the only ones receiving a bailout from the government. Which would have cost the government more in the long term.

Large banks like JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs had already paid back the government bailout by July 2009.

[–] BCsven@lemmy.ca 43 points 1 year ago

So the banks paid it back by charging you more fees, and less interest on your savings

[–] explodicle@local106.com 26 points 1 year ago

We are considering inflation. Then add on risk adjustment, and we can see it for the corporate charity it is. If it was a good investment, then we wouldn't have been forced to make it. Yes there was enough private capital to cover these loans.

Them being "forced" to take loans is irrelevant because they're the ones buying policy, not us. One interest rate for them, another higher interest rate for them to charge you.

We are being robbed blind.

[–] 0Empty0@lemmy.world 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Are we just going to ignore all the jobs that were lost when the economy crashed? Not just in the U.S. either.

All because there was an inordinate amount of really bad housing loans that banks KNEW were bad, and just continued to give the loans out.

If you'd like to learn more about this, Inside Job is a great documentary about this.