How Managing Money Creates Huge Profits For The Federal Reserve

Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Most parts of the government cost money to run, lots of money. But there's one government institution which consistently makes a very large profit in a pretty unusual way. In fact, it recently reported its most profitable year ever. David Kestenbaum with our Planet Money podcast explains. DAVID KESTENBAUM, BYLINE: This moneymaking part of the government is actually the moneymaking part of the government, the Federal Reserve, the place in charge of how many dollars are out there, the bills in your wallet, the digital money in bank accounts. Making money turns out to be a nice little business. JOE GAGNON: Yes, it is. KESTENBAUM: This is Joe Gagnon. He's at the Peterson Institute, but he used to work at the Fed which last year - are you ready? - made a profit of over $100 billion. That is enough to fund the National Park Service, NASA, the National Science Foundation, the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Aviation