Gold value (https://www.gold.org/goldhub/data/gold-prices)

  Apr 2000: $274/oz
  Apr 2005: $425/oz (+55%)
  Apr 2010: $1132/oz (+166% in 5 years, +313% in 10 years)
  Apr 2015: $1175/oz (+3% in 5 years, +176% in 10 years)
  Apr 2020: $1647/oz (+40% in 5 years, +45% in 10 years)

So we can see that Gold was massively inflating until 2010, when you say the fed started printing money, since then it's stabilised, even with the current panic

House prices in the US (https://dqydj.com/historical-home-prices/)

  Apr 2000: $134k
  Apr 2005: $199k
  Apr 2010: $183k
  Apr 2015: $210k
  Apr 2019: $269k

So 2010-2019 is a 46% increase, or 4.5% per year, so about 50% for 10 years. 2000 to 2010 is 36%, but the charts indicate we're nearing the top of another house price bubble (1998-2007 was an 80% increase over 9 years, or 7.5% increase per year)

So I'm not sure your assertions that the increase of these values are due to quantitive easing over the last 10 years holds.

You're quoting figures that a lump of rock has doubled and doubled in value since 2000 (plus a little bit). The BLS inflation calculator [0] tells me that inflation would have gotten the price to $420 by now (heh) which is not a doubling in anyone's book.

The trend is persistent, the rock is much the same as it has ever been. Do you have an alternate thesis to QE for why this is happening or are you happy to write it off as a mystery?

[0] https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm

Gold started increasing in value in 2001

QE didn't start until November 2008 (gold = $814) That stopped by Nobember 2014 (gold = $1232). 51% increase in gold over 6 years, or 7% per year.

That is far lower than the increase in gold in other 6 year periods which didn't have QE.

A very fair point with which I can only agree. Care to hazard a guess as to why gold is rising though? The rock isn't changing.

Gold gets used in electronics, so real world demand is up, and it's actually fairly hard to extract. This is being made harder by environmental protections that are making it illegal in many places to do things that are more efficient but come at a high environmental cost.

I wish we would actively foster panning for gold. It's environmentally friendly. It's "blue collar" work that doesn't require a college degree, spiffy resume and do forth and it doesn't take much gold per year to potentially support someone who otherwise might be homeless or flipping burgers (or both).

Panning is very location-specific, though. How does access for panning relate to land ownership / public management of rivers?

I don't know the answer to the land management piece. I do know that we live in a world that increasingly makes it hard for people just do a thing and make a living, without a college degree, a raft load of student loans and on and on.

I do know we have too little well-paid manual labor and too much of a divide between the have and have nots. I know you don't need much more than a gold pan to get started, which can be had for under ten dollars from places like Walmart.

I didn't research the land owenership/public management of rivers angle very much. I do know that it's not illegal in some places to dredge rivers on public land, which is extremely disruptive of the ecosystem.

This is more of less the summary of the research I did into the subject:

https://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2016/11/h...

A richer world (both from more people and more economic activity) increases demand for things like jewelery, more use for gold (booming semiconductors) increases demand too.

There's then the perception that in bad times gold is a "safe bet". Low returns in savings accounts too.

We can’t print more gold.

Also, annualized S&P 500 Return with Dividends Reinvested from april 2010 to april 2020 are 9.694% [0] which is entirely in line with historical returns [1].

[0]: https://dqydj.com/sp-500-return-calculator/

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%26P_500_Index#Performance

    2010, when you say the fed
    started printing money

I did not say the FED started printing money in 2010. I said nothing about the time before 2010 or about the future.

Your argument would have been much more precise and useful if you focussed on the same timeframe as I did: 2010-2020. Mixing it with the time before and what you read in the charts for the future muddled it to a degree that I find it hard to reply.

I thought you implied that they started printing vastly more starting in 2010:

>The reason why inflation "officially" is lower then what one would expect given the amount of money printed lies in the way it is calculated.

I think comparing over a long period of time makes sense to see if something really fundamentally changed about the value of money lately.

>Your argument would have been much more precise and useful if you focussed on the same timeframe as I did: 2010-2020.

If things were really different over the past decade than any other, you'd expect to find discrepancies when comparing to previous decades. You're the one "muddling" it here in my (poorly educated) opinion.

I must add that you using Bitcoin, an insanely speculative asset, as an example of things becoming more expensive over the past decade didn't really help your point in my mind. It seems to imply that Bitcoin's value is somewhat stable and we can use it as a reference for the value of a dollar. If you used Beanie Baby prices instead we're in the middle of a huge deflation!

Real Estate is not quite as bad as a reference point, but we have to remember that the decade started right at the end of the mortgage crisis so that distorted the prices somewhat (in what direction? I'm not sure).

    If things were really different over the
    past decade than any other

I did not state that. I only stated that FED-money doubled in 2010-2020 and the value of money halfed.

I said nothing about any other decade.

Maybe the same happened in 2000-2010 or any other decade, maybe not. It is not part of my statement.

Look again. The 2015-2020 increases dwarf the 2010-2015 increases. What changed?

Same things that changed in 2000-2005 and 2005-2010.

Please specify.

Many many factors not relating to quantative easing

That's incredibly nonspecific.

Inflation only reduces the value of money not other goods. So, if your savings is in wine, land, gold, or whatever then low levels are not that important. Put another way the difference between 1% and 2% inflation is roughly cutting the value of money in half over 70 or 35 years. But, it’s hard to really notice then difference between them on a month by month basis.

Inflation indices do include rent and real estate. Housing costs is the single largest component in CPI.

Equities have had a gigantic bull market since an incredible low after the financial crisis. Of course it costs significantly more to buy at the top of the market than at the bottom.

Rent and real estate are artificially low because of rent control. In a free market, the value decrease of money would be more visible compared to these assets.

Calling the prise increase in equities a "bull market" does not change the fact that the prise increased.

CPI includes owner-occupied housing as well, not just rent.

If you are going to define bull markets as inflation, then you are ruling out the possibility that the economy can ever just do well. We had a horrible crash a decade ago. In the last couple of years, the economy has done well with record low unemployment. Of course equity prices went up.

and college education.

Is this true everywhere in the world?