Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

forbes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 136 posts

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#41

Post by anonporridge »

ping_pong wrote: post #12

Economists like Bernanke have talked about dropping money from helicopters in the sky, in order to prevent deflation. What the government has done in the last year with its $10+ trillion in stimulus, is the exact definition of dropping money from helicopters and yet no one is pointing this out. Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. The fact that everyone keeps talking abou…

You must have been getting a very different information stream than me.

People have been decrying (or praising) the helicopter money of the past year+ since before it even started. Hell, there was even a moment in March/April of last year when people were speculating that Trump might even implement a form of UBI.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#42

Post by thatfrenchguy »

ping_pong wrote: post #12

Economists like Bernanke have talked about dropping money from helicopters in the sky, in order to prevent deflation. What the government has done in the last year with its $10+ trillion in stimulus, is the exact definition of dropping money from helicopters and yet no one is pointing this out. Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. The fact that everyone keeps talking abou…

And clearly we're seeing this not causing massive inflation, given the inflation is <5% everywhere over the last decade.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#43

Post by dominotw »

jdhn wrote: post #14
ping_pong wrote: post #12

Economists like Bernanke have talked about dropping money from helicopters in the sky, in order to prevent deflation. What the government has done in the last year with its $10+ trillion in stimulus, is the exact definition of dropping money from helicopters and yet no one is pointing this out. Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. The fact that everyone keeps talking abou…

I could go for some deflation in the housing market right about now.

same here. Interest rates are going up so there is some hope.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#44

Post by rejectedandsad »

whymauri wrote: post #18
fridif wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still waiting on mine!

Literally never got a stimulus. Students, especially poor students on scholarships, are so thoroughly fucked by the US tax system. It's gotten to the point that schools like Princeton and Stanford encourage low-income full-ride students to avoid declaring their tax liability at all, arguing that they're better off dealing with that monster when they actually have income (in software, finance, etc where the tax liabil…

Wow I feel so sorry for those elites, what more can we do to avoid such a tragedy for them?

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#45

Post by otnihoithiu »

ping_pong wrote: post #12

Economists like Bernanke have talked about dropping money from helicopters in the sky, in order to prevent deflation. What the government has done in the last year with its $10+ trillion in stimulus, is the exact definition of dropping money from helicopters and yet no one is pointing this out. Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. The fact that everyone keeps talking abou…

Another thing people complain about is the wealth gap.

Inflation increases the value of assets. Wealthy people own assets and poor people consume goods to survive. As a result, inflation increases the gap between the wealthy and the poor.

The only realistic way to reduce the wealth gap is to accept deflationary periods. This would also improve the savings rate and reduce debt.

I understand that modern theories believe deflation to be the end of days. I attribute that belief to the fact that a deflationary period was observed during the great depression, and has been believed to be a cause rather than an effect. I frankly disagree with that viewpoint.

I believe that the government has a vested interest in ensuring inflation because the government is a debtor. A protracted period of deflation would bankrupt the government.

People cite the post-war period as one of a smaller wealth gap, but the primary reason for that is that there had been a ten year period of deflation just proceeding it.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#46

Post by blacksqr »

lumost wrote: post #21
blacksqr wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article reports that 72% of respondents said their income has not increased. So whatever trillions of dollars were created don't seem to have made it to the populace. Either the respondents are not a representative sample of consumers, in which case the article's conclusions are of little value; or something other than increased consumer spending, like supply chain issues, is causing the inflation.

It's surprisingly plausible that wages would not rise and inflation would speed up. This can occur because companies lay off employees due to rising costs and lack of demand (while raising their own prices) or because the money is going to some alternate consumption. Food prices could increase today simply because one or more of the beneficiaries of those trillions of dollars has allocated it to land acquisition. Ret…

> It's surprisingly plausible that wages would not rise and inflation would speed up.

I agree entirely. But the linked article explicitly blames increased deficit government spending. The article reads like a stealth attack on stimulus, with the implicit point that inflation should be controlled by ending it, rather than looking more deeply at causes like the ones you suggest -- which might lead to solutions that a Forbes contributor might not like, like taxing the rich.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#47

Post by rejectedandsad »

anotha1 wrote: post #6

I'll take "inflation" if it means trillion dollar spending packages are more likely to reach human citizens instead of corporations.

Fully agree. The inflation story is completely overplayed, mostly as a partisan cudgel.

We should deal with the effects of inflation when we see the effects of inflation.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#48

Post by jrs235 »

purple_ferret wrote: post #24
trey-jones wrote: post #2

Wow. Who could have foreseen this? I suppose that's different from "Who could have stopped this?" Our economic problems are not easy ones to solve, but when trillions of dollars of are created out of thin air and distributed to the populace, you had to know this was coming.

The idea that more cash has driven up the price of basic goods this quickly is almost certainly frivolous. The pressure simply isn't there, especially with wages still so low. That's not to say prices haven't been suppressed over the years in various ways that combat normal inflation (6oz denim Jeans that are now 10% Spandex I'm looking at you) and there's a ton of money in the system that have mostly went into asset…

It's not just more cash (increase "demand"), it's also reduced supplies due to many businesses shuttering or reducing output during covid.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#49

Post by carlmr »

thrwawy12345 wrote: post #36
ping_pong wrote: post #12

Economists like Bernanke have talked about dropping money from helicopters in the sky, in order to prevent deflation. What the government has done in the last year with its $10+ trillion in stimulus, is the exact definition of dropping money from helicopters and yet no one is pointing this out. Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. The fact that everyone keeps talking abou…

> Which means we must have narrowly averted a truly horrific situation as a country. Citation needed. I don't understand the logic here.

Not OP. I think the idea is that we dumped so much money into the economy and had so little inflation now, that not dropping the money would have meant severe deflation.

Re: 83% of Americans Are Belt Tightening Due to Inflation Pressures

#50

Post by blacksqr »

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #38
blacksqr wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article reports that 72% of respondents said their income has not increased. So whatever trillions of dollars were created don't seem to have made it to the populace. Either the respondents are not a representative sample of consumers, in which case the article's conclusions are of little value; or something other than increased consumer spending, like supply chain issues, is causing the inflation.

> something other than increased consumer spending, like supply chain issues, is causing the inflation My (naive) understanding is these are tightly linked. The process is something like: => Consumers have more cash to spend on goods. => Consumers buy more goods => More demand is created for commodities to build those goods => Demand for commodities exceeds demand => Commodity prices inflate => Manufactured good pric…

Yes but the article explicitly states that the vast majority of consumers don't have more cash to spend. So the cause of the inflation must be something else.
Post reply on HN