The Bank of England’s big coronavirus gamble

Ten billion here. Twenty billion there. At least we now know where Rishi Sunak is getting all the money from. As of today, the Bank of England has quietly started directly financing the government. Instead of selling gilts to fund the difference between what it raises in taxes and what it spends the Bank is simply going to increase the government’s account, normally a relatively trivial £370 million, to what it discreetly describes as an ‘unlimited amount’. How much might that be? No one knows, but the final number could easily have ten zeros at the end of it.

What is known in the economics textbooks by the rather dramatic name of ‘helicopter money’ – where the government simply prints lots of cash and chucks it out of helicopters onto grateful citizens – has begun. Can that possibly work? Just possibly, but it is going to be a high-wire act, and the risk of catastrophe if either the Bank or the Chancellor lose their balance is very high.