The government owns the central bank, so the debt is to itself, and the interest expense comes back to the government as the central bank’s profit. If central bank holdings of government debt were converted into non-interest-bearing perpetual obligations, nothing substantive would change, but it would become obvious that some previously issued public debt did not need to be repaid.
正如卡门·莱因哈特与肯尼思·罗格夫最近发表的一篇国际货币基金组织论文所指出的那样，那些发达经济都面临着一些无法仅仅借助一系列紧缩，拖延和增长就能消除的债务负担。但如果一家央行也持有本国债券的话，那就再也不存在什么纯粹的公共债务责任了。央行为政府所有，因此等于政府自己向自己借债， 而利息支出又以央行利息收入的形式返还给了政府。即便央行持有的政府债券被转化成无息长期债券，也不会有任何实质性的改变，但很显然一些从前发行的公共债权都不再需要偿还了。