News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by datadrivenangel on Monday October 09, 2023 @10:49AM (#37821015)
I visited Argentina earlier this year, and the psychological effects of years of inflation were very real. The exchange rate has gone from 5 pesos per USD, to 350 officially in the last 10 years. The unofficial rate is up to almost 900 pesos per USD. In March the unofficial rate was half of that, so the currency has lost 50% of its value in the last 6 months.

Everybody prefers to be paid in dollars, and if you're getting paid in cash, why pay taxes? I had an Argentinian tell me that I could pay ~25% of the list price if I paid in USD instead of credit card, because the unofficial exchange rate and not paying taxes on it would save that much. Money requires trust that you can exchange it for goods and services, which are provided by other members of society, so debasing the money supply like this is killing society in the lovely country of Argentina.

Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by amjnsx on Monday October 09, 2023 @11:14AM (#37821292)
It’s a tale as old as time unfortunately. Currencies have been debased for centuries.

It won’t change until we have actual hard money that can’t be debased by leaders/bankers/politicians.

Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by diogenes4 on Monday October 09, 2023 @01:15PM (#37822702)
Sorry, is there any reason to expect money to revert to behaving like gold any time soon? Sounds suspiciously like crypto tripe. Why would that be beneficial anyway? The relative purchasing power of poor countries won't change without some serious shifting in resource distribution worldwide.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by latchkey on Monday October 09, 2023 @03:18PM (#37824177)
I saved this comment a while ago... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26238410
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by rando_dfad on Monday October 09, 2023 @01:27PM (#37822875)
Hard as gold, perhaps?

That creates other issues. Volatility, for one.

Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by ImHereToVote on Tuesday October 10, 2023 @03:44AM (#37829502)
Gold creates hoarding behavior. Bitcoin has the same down side. Currencies need to have fluidity. The problem is how the fluidity happens. It can't be controlled by private interests. This is an unsolved monetary problem. I don't think it's unsolvable though.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by hbossy on Monday October 09, 2023 @11:06AM (#37821225)
Is it harder to travel from abroad? I imagine that thousands of $1 bills might rise some eyebrows at customs.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by latchkey on Monday October 09, 2023 @03:16PM (#37824154)
Imagine a plane full of people carrying gold nuggets in their pockets.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by datadrivenangel on Monday October 09, 2023 @07:49PM (#37826913)
You get the best exchange rate with crisp $100 bills, and any USD that is damaged or too worn will get rejected by the money changers... Which makes you see where the demand for dollars is greatest (The wealthy).
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by HPsquared on Monday October 09, 2023 @11:50AM (#37821678)
Sounds like society is continuing, on a USD basis. Society ≠ government. They're usually orthogonal, and often go against each other.
[dead]
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by dang on Monday October 09, 2023 @10:23PM (#37827904)
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by anon1199022 on Monday October 09, 2023 @12:21PM (#37821989)
Lovely country of Argentina had 9 defaults in it's history. Maybe people and their parents, which certain % of them are part of government or economy. Should start taking little more responsilibity to understand how Finance works long term? Naa, let's default again and not even understand how debt and modern monetary system works. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/photo-essays/2019-09-11/one-c...
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by giraffe_lady on Monday October 09, 2023 @01:05PM (#37822592)
Anything else come to mind in argentina's history that might be relevant?
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by anon1199022 on Monday October 09, 2023 @01:15PM (#37822709)
no but I love how truth is dowvoted
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by is_true on Monday October 09, 2023 @02:26PM (#37823522)
The money is provided by that monetary system you speak of.
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by anon1199022 on Tuesday October 10, 2023 @10:55AM (#37832904)
accepted and mismanaged several times by the different governments and public?
Re:Financial anxiety: The alarming side effect of inflation by is_true on Tuesday October 10, 2023 @07:15PM (#37838991)
Just the governments, most people are not educated enough to understand that at some point you have to pay for all that welfare. Inflation is called a "hidden tax" after all.