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Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

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Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#141

Post by daeroth »

foverzar wrote: post #88
jyriand wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You will still get the state pension. The part you are able to cash out is managed by other funds(banks etc) and it would act as an extra to state offered pension.

> You will still get the state pension What exactly would fund it then? Pensions system typically works by current generation providing for the previous. If we allow newer generations to "cash out", what would be the source of funding?

The pension system in Estonia consists of a shared fund "First Pillar" and an individual specific fund "Second Pillar". Part of your salary goes into the pension system and gets split between these two funds.

So the current workforce is helping to keep up the First pillar for the current pensioners. But at the same time the current workforce is making deposits into the Second Pillar which just invests their money into the markets.

So people can liquidate their Second Pillar without messing up the First Pillar for everyone else.

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#143

Post by pohl »

rjzzleep wrote: post #89
jgilias wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. If you notice, the second and third place are taken by Lithuania and Latvia respectively. A lot of 'cheapness' in all kinds of sectors came from RUS/UKR/BEL somewhere upstream. Building materials being a prime example. So, a combined effect of energy prices, sanctions on RUS, a war raging in Ukraine. But then, as Estonian prime minister said recently - sure, gas is expensive, but freedom is priceless.

I'm sorry, but the Estonian prime minister is a Eurocrat idiot that lacks basic understanding of how either military or economy work or operate. You want to be independent of Hydrocarbons and Russian commodities? Okay well the Chinese model of silently building up the capabilities to do that is one way to approach the issue. France is an even better example of the idiocy of this as France had one of the most advanced…

...they don't even have the most basic understanding of...I'm completely baffled at how people cannot comprehend...

Maybe it's not a failure to understand. Maybe it's a symptom of the world-wide denial-of-service attack against the very concept of democracy. It doesn't cost much to pay someone to make government look bad. If you're an autocrat, it's kind of a no-brainer.

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#144

Post by jgilias »

rjzzleep wrote: post #89
jgilias wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. If you notice, the second and third place are taken by Lithuania and Latvia respectively. A lot of 'cheapness' in all kinds of sectors came from RUS/UKR/BEL somewhere upstream. Building materials being a prime example. So, a combined effect of energy prices, sanctions on RUS, a war raging in Ukraine. But then, as Estonian prime minister said recently - sure, gas is expensive, but freedom is priceless.

I'm sorry, but the Estonian prime minister is a Eurocrat idiot that lacks basic understanding of how either military or economy work or operate. You want to be independent of Hydrocarbons and Russian commodities? Okay well the Chinese model of silently building up the capabilities to do that is one way to approach the issue. France is an even better example of the idiocy of this as France had one of the most advanced…

Yes, it's a problem that there are co-dependencies with Russia. Yes, it's a grave mistake that Europe didn't untangle from those right after 2014. But not untangling them now would be completely brain-dead. I mean... Russia is now a rogue state carrying out scorched earth tactics, officially rewarding units guilty of war crimes (killing of civilians, rape), threatening the world with nuclear weapons, hijacking planes, stealing intellectual property in the open, etc, etc, etc... It's just... mind-blowing that there are still voices out there trying to figure out a way to 'talk it through'. That boat has long sailed.

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#146

Post by welkj23jOIJ3 »

Inflation is highly manipulated by goverment and is usually 2x lower than real inflation. On the following site you can check the inflation calculated based on the past methods (before 1990):

http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/inflation-charts

as you can see, inflation calculated using the old method is 2x higher than the current one (8% vs 16%)

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#147

Post by dmix »

rjzzleep wrote: post #89
jgilias wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. If you notice, the second and third place are taken by Lithuania and Latvia respectively. A lot of 'cheapness' in all kinds of sectors came from RUS/UKR/BEL somewhere upstream. Building materials being a prime example. So, a combined effect of energy prices, sanctions on RUS, a war raging in Ukraine. But then, as Estonian prime minister said recently - sure, gas is expensive, but freedom is priceless.

I'm sorry, but the Estonian prime minister is a Eurocrat idiot that lacks basic understanding of how either military or economy work or operate. You want to be independent of Hydrocarbons and Russian commodities? Okay well the Chinese model of silently building up the capabilities to do that is one way to approach the issue. France is an even better example of the idiocy of this as France had one of the most advanced…

Historically wars (as awful as they were) often had a way of realigning politics/economic understanding with reality. The world has been so peaceful for so long that they lose sight of the fragility of success and wealth.

So much of modern political history is taking the economic gains for granted and assuming they will stay consistent (or only be a minor inconvenience) despite an endless march of downward pressure on many of the things that made us productive and progress.

For a long time the only thing that has masked it is the gains from globalization (even though the a big percentage of the returns often only went to megacorps and the well connected). But that will either reach its limits or conflicts will disrupt it. Then we see the costs of crippling of industries, getting rid knowledge, or misalign incentives.

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#148

Post by danuker »

mnd999 wrote: post #133
mostly_harmless wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what's missing here is in case 1, it's not just the amount of money, but how much money is chasing each available good. You can imagine if the money supply doubles, a loaf of bread can be the same price as before if there are twice as many people demanding the same portion of bread (for a very crude approximation) Or to put it another way, maybe case 1 is demand-side inflation, and case 2 is supply-side infla…

If the money is doubled but most of it goes into offshore investment funds because those on the receiving end already have enough bread then the price of bread doesn’t really change, but venture cap funding becomes more readily available.

And P/E ratios go to fantasy land!

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#149

Post by tejohnso »

panick21_ wrote: post #108
tejohnso wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought it was pretty common knowledge that inflation numbers are deceptive and easily manipulated. It's [controversial]. It's the decline of purchasing power over time based on a basket of goods / services. So it all depends on how you fill that basket. [controversial]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/07/consumerpriceindex....

That might work for some measures of inflation, but it doesn't work for the 'GDP Deflator' for example. That is a different way to measure inflation (and a more exact one) and it not so easy to fake. And even if we go with CPI stuff, the agencies that do these things try to stay consistent. At least in western countries they don't just do whatever they want. The idea that all departments of all western governments ar…

> The idea that all departments of all western governments are secretly changing the data

I don't think they have to do it secretly. They do it in the open, otherwise there wouldn't be an Investopedia article on CPI controversy that clearly indicates a few problems. There's no internal whistle blowing going on. It's in the open.

> And even if we go with CPI stuff, the agencies that do these things try to stay consistent.

Sure, perhaps they "try", but:

"Over the years, the methodology used to calculate the CPI has undergone numerous revisions".

"Some critics view the methodological changes and the switch from a cost of goods index (COGI) to a cost of living index (COLI) as a purposeful manipulation that allows the U.S. government to report a lower CPI."

My personal problem with CPI is that it doesn't include the cost of purchasing a home. I get it...it's not a "consumer good" or whatever. But if you're talking about inflation, and everyone jumps to CPI for that, then CPI should include it, or maybe the media should stop quoting it so much. It's not representative of what people want it to be. People want a way to quantify how much harder it is to establish a good life with their earnings. And I don't think the government is being honest about that. Maybe it's too much to ask.

Re: Estonia clocks fastest inflation in the Eurozone at 20.1 percent

#150

Post by seanmcdirmid »

rax0m wrote: post #116
yodsanklai wrote: post #36

I don't understand inflation. I understand that it's a measure of the price of things, but for me there should be two types of inflations 1. a dilution of money. Let say a central bank injects a lot of new money, then all prices will be higher, but salary will be higher too, and the overall effect is neutral 2. some prices increase due to change in supply or demand (e.g. gas or cereal), but salaries and everything el…

Inflation is an increase in the money supply. If you see everything from this lens then it all makes sense. Prices of specific commodities and consumables may rise or fall, but if the money supply and demand remains the same the overall combined price of everything remains the same.

Inflation is an increase in money supply over an increase in the value of things to buy with money (or we could say the size of the economy). Money supply could increase, but if it is balanced with a growth in good supply, inflation doesn’t occur. This is why it can’t be computed directly.
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