Re:America's True Unemployment Rate
by pdonis on Thursday October 22, 2020 @04:59PM
(#24863233)
> I'm talking more about on a practical level in terms of the prices that most people will see/experience when they are going about there daily life.
It's quite true that people are used to seeing a particular price level, and changes in either direction tend to cause them problems, even though, abstractly speaking, decreases in prices should be seen as a good thing.
> I'm talking more about on a practical level in terms of the prices that most people will see/experience when they are going about there daily life. I even cited very real examples of both demand pull and cost push inflation that have nothing to do with the money supply. These as far as I know are all examples acknowledged by economists as causes of inflation.
And this is a misuse of the term "inflation", because "inflation" is supposed to be bad, and so economists are basically trying to argue that the natural ups and downs of business, which are unavoidable in a world where things are constantly changing and nobody has a crystal ball, are bad things that the government needs to intervene to stop. We would all be much better off if economists would stop peddling such nonsense and just frankly admit to us all that, well, the natural ups and downs of business are unavoidable in a world where things are constantly changing and nobody has a crystal ball--not even economists.
> If for example tomorrow there were a super volcano explosion and a catastrophic decline in the world's food supply, we would see a massive spike in food costs
Yes, and what would happen next?
In a sane world, what would happen is that entrepreneurs would start figuring out ways to produce more food, because there is obviously a huge need for that, as shown by the huge price signal in food. Maybe they would build huge greenhouses with solar lamps powered by nuclear electricity. Maybe they would figure out how to harvest algae in quantity to make algaeburgers.
In our actual world, what happens is that governments wring their hands and pontificate and monkey with the economy and make things worse instead of better.
It's quite true that people are used to seeing a particular price level, and changes in either direction tend to cause them problems, even though, abstractly speaking, decreases in prices should be seen as a good thing.
> I'm talking more about on a practical level in terms of the prices that most people will see/experience when they are going about there daily life. I even cited very real examples of both demand pull and cost push inflation that have nothing to do with the money supply. These as far as I know are all examples acknowledged by economists as causes of inflation.
And this is a misuse of the term "inflation", because "inflation" is supposed to be bad, and so economists are basically trying to argue that the natural ups and downs of business, which are unavoidable in a world where things are constantly changing and nobody has a crystal ball, are bad things that the government needs to intervene to stop. We would all be much better off if economists would stop peddling such nonsense and just frankly admit to us all that, well, the natural ups and downs of business are unavoidable in a world where things are constantly changing and nobody has a crystal ball--not even economists.
> If for example tomorrow there were a super volcano explosion and a catastrophic decline in the world's food supply, we would see a massive spike in food costs
Yes, and what would happen next?
In a sane world, what would happen is that entrepreneurs would start figuring out ways to produce more food, because there is obviously a huge need for that, as shown by the huge price signal in food. Maybe they would build huge greenhouses with solar lamps powered by nuclear electricity. Maybe they would figure out how to harvest algae in quantity to make algaeburgers.
In our actual world, what happens is that governments wring their hands and pontificate and monkey with the economy and make things worse instead of better.