They can't do a whole lot because they already fucked up monetary policy in the last 10 years. They spent the last decade dismantling the breaks from the car to get it going and now that it's going, they can't slow down anymore.
Seems like maybe there are systemic issues with the economy...maybe concentrating wealth in the hands of so few doesn’t make for a robust economy that can handle some punches.
It's hardly in ruin, has more cash on the balance sheet than, for example, all the help sent to Ukraine, military and humanitarian. It's just that making a shit ton of money ain't actually that fun because your job is basically to constantly patch holes in this gargantuan ship that never stops.
Aside from the economic disruption everyone else has mentioned, there's also the incredibly expensive war they are currently engaged in. Income is plummeting while expenses are going through the roof.
Read Lyn Alden's "Broken Money" you'll get a very different perspective.
There's not much benevolence in the current petrodollar system. It effectively enslaves smaller economies to decisions of The Fed; then add in the World Bank and the IMF and the economic death grip tightens.
Petrodollars are a heavy thumb on the scale. Alter the strength of that system and the world order changes. That is, sovereign states become sovereign. Smaller economies are victimized far less often. Etc.
That aside, we're talking about the cartel that crashed the WORLD economy just 10ish years ago. If that isn't cause for pause I'm not sure what is. There's more to life than convenience.
This is not about money flow. I'm fine with that. What is not fine is the state capture this money flow facilitates. The state capture propagates a crony system, that will lead to a reduced economic output from what it could have been, and hence requiring more support in the future. The situation is both economically and politically untenable.
Not just that, but they've also been running huge deficits every year. That's what the loans from the Troika have been funding, after all. The deficit has been >10% of GDP every year since 2009, except 2013 when it was "just" 8.5%.
And in addition to deficit and currency controls, also price controls which have destroyed markets. Then you have a political police enforcing silly laws about companies will have to continue to produce something even when it is economically unfeasible. In the short term you get some physical deliverables like bread next week; in the long term you get a dysfunctional economy.
The system costs money, and when state resources are tight because they're trying to handle catastrophic global warming, it's easy to imagine that money going elsewhere.
Just look at all the 'belt-tightening' that occurred after the financial crisis.Then imagine what's going to happen to the international economy when the fundamentals are continuously being smashed by extreme weather, mass displacement, crop failure, political instability, and war.
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