The financial crisis took out a few players (banks / investment banks) in the credit market. The absence of these financial intermediaries would have resulted in lower credit being available to main street. Rates would also have risen, with banks not willing to take on additional risk. QE was supposed to ensure that this did not happen, by making ample liquidity available in the system.
So, in the worst case, QE just didn't work out since there was not much demand for credit from the "main street", but it didn't make it worse either, right?
It hasn't made it worse, but its efficacy was low.
QE and low interest rates postponed the crisis but it is going to be worse and will probably end up in hyper inflation and wars
I really don't see QE and wars being linked, especially since most of the modernized world has engaged in some kind of QE (neither wars fought with military or economic/trade wars). Also the fact that banks are keeping the majority of the money they get from QE as excess reserves at the federal reserve is preventing inflation from getting out of hand.
Fiat allows bigger and more expensive wars; QE and low interest rates is a way not to be honest about the situation and to hide the problems for a while; when the problems will come back and be bigger, the politicians will not accept it and say they were wrong.
QE+low interest rates manipulate the markets heavily which can come back in the form of frustration, protests or wars.
In the US the politicians tend to regulate for the big banks and the big corporations such as the military industry; wars are good for the former so wars are made. Politicians are often sociopaths who want to control everyone so they are likely to start wars when their fallacious economic actions are unsucessful
It sounds like you are implying that QE allows for governments to borrow at artificially low interest rates in order to pay for wars. Although this is technically true this has not happened, but rather the opposite. The US has withdrawn from one War (Iraq) and has not entered into really any conflicts since QE started. Instead the US and much of europe has used QE for social programs to give away money to the lazy and less successful.
The money given to the social programs is small when comparing to money given to the defense industry.
Beside, much of the social programs were paid by taxpayers having the money deduct every month from the paycheck, I won't call it "free" money.
Most social programs are funded by the majority of the people and consumed by few (although "few" is expanding at a dangerous rate today). I was referring to programs like disability insurance, food stamps, welfare, unemployment insurance and the like. Disability for example rarely sees anyone ever drop from it's roles once someone starts receiving benefits.
All taxes are taken from an employee's paycheck every month as they are required to pay taxes based on their income.
There is not a dime that is
given to the defense industry. There are defense contractors that receive payment for their goods that they produce to keep our country secure but this is far from being given to them. To further counter your argument, the amount spent on social programs far exceeds the total defense budget.
