The cost of money

Talking about the Bank of England and the UK Treasury, Peter Jones (Comment, 26 February) notes that “quantitative easing is a form of printing money” and that sterling “has depreciated against both the euro and the US dollar by about 8 per cent since January”.

This should not be surprising to anyone, as what is commonly known as quantitative easing is, in fact, inflation, and is, by definition, the excess issue of currency. Inflation reduces the value of currency and the resultant tendency for prices to soar is a consequence that is wrongly called “inflation”.

Such a policy remains popular at political level as it affords the state a convenient means of fleecing productive citizens and creating class war in order to bolster its power base.

Bruce Crichton

Victoria Road

Falkirk