Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us? • Hacker News Board

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#251

Post by washywashy » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:07 AM UTC

rdtwo wrote: post #134

compumike wrote: post #17

It may also help to see the cumulative inflation picture: https://totalrealreturns.com/s/USDOLLAR?normalize=end (disclosure: my side project) The 1974 and 1980 peaks from the article correspond to the steeper slope regions in those same years on my graph. (I'm plotting 1/[CPI-U price level], while the article is plotting d/dt [CPI-U price level]) On my y-axis is the purchasing power of a US dollar, relative to curren…

Yeah but that’s not the whole picture… in 1962 the ford truck was $2000 now is around 40,000 so while a new one is better you still have to earn 2x as much to get the most basic one available

And most people rarely need a pickup truck for its specifically design utility. They likely just want a safer car which is essentially an arms race at that point. I think less pickup trucks on the road would be a good thing considering how the majority of people drive.

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#252

Post by RichEO » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:12 AM UTC

buscoquadnary wrote: post #243

jelliclesfarm wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes. even though technically california doesnt 'print money'. people are more important than economy. the 'redistribution' is happening to help the most vulnerable and that's exactly what surpluses should be used for..seems like a good use of money to me.

I hate it when people make it seem like the economy and the people are two different things. The economy is the aggregate capability of a society to provide goods and services to people, if the economy collapses the goods and services that are being provided cease to be as well and people are worse off. Short sighted statements like "people are more important than the economy" is a feel good virtue signaling that is…

This use of the word “economy” in this expression means, “the economy, as commonly measured by GDP”.

The economy might be the aggregate production of society, but the distribution of the fruits of that production are not meaningless.

Nobody is proposing a return to subsistence farming, but some of us are willing to trade off a higher GDP for more equal distribution.

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#253

Post by stingraycharles » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:15 AM UTC

unity1001 wrote: post #238

beerdoggie wrote: post #54

In California, people fitting certain economic criteria are now being issued $1000 checks for inflation relief. This is beyond ludicrous. We have printed so much money, the only solution is to... print more? It's almost like it is all a sneaky backdoor to letting the government redistribute wealth without real oversight...

> In California, people fitting certain economic criteria are now being issued $1000 checks for inflation relief. This is beyond ludicrous. Its not. Its happening in Europe too. Its a way to try to get people through the winter and avoid the energy crisis impacting ordinary people. That's what a government should do - take care of its people during extraordinary times.

Yeah in the grand scheme of things, this doesn’t impact inflation all that much, but it does help the people that need it most. Just like increasing the minimum wage to keep up with inflation does.

Over the past year businesses have increased their prices all over the board, you can’t then just simply say “but inflation!!” when you want to help the people with some amount of compensation for this.

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#254

Post by ajross » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:20 AM UTC

Syonyk wrote: post #168

maxerickson wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Concern over US natural gas supply is not warranted. At all. If producers decided not to produce during a period of high prices (unlikely), we have gas in storage, right now, to last through the typical winter. https://ir.eia.gov/ngs/ngs.html (unfortunately, export capacity is a rounding error, so we can't do a whole lot to help Europe out. https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/ng_move_expc_s1_a.htm )

> Concern over US natural gas supply is not warranted. At all. How'd that work for Texas a couple winters ago? Or a decade ago? Supply is more than just what's in the ground - it's the entire infrastructure related to delivering it to the various loads, and we've demonstrated at various points that it's not in as good of shape as people like to assume. Also, someone is literally blowing up pipelines over in Europe. D…

Texas didn't suffer a gas shortage? There was a weather-caused generation capacity crisis, which is a rather different resource. Is that what you're thinking about?

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#255

Post by Victerius » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:20 AM UTC

btbuildem wrote: post #249

koolba wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Too bad there's a $10k annual deposit limit. It’s $10K per tax identifier, so if you’re married you just doubled it. If you have kids, each of them can buy $10K as well (though be sure to understand that you’re permanently transferring the assets to them, you can’t take it back it’s effectively an early inheritance). You can also buy $10K as a corporation, LLC, or anything else with a tax identifier.

So you could technically open N LLCs and stick $10k in each of them?

No.

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#256

Post by fshbbdssbbgdd » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:22 AM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #245

mrb wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I go to ford.com and look at their basic truck, the 2023 Maverick, I see "starting at $22,195". So if a 1962 truck truly sold for $2000, the inflation seems to account for entirely the price increase. And I'm pretty sure everyone will agree a 2023 Maverick is superior to a 1962 F-100 in every conceivable aspect. Housing and healthcare are better examples of goods or services whose prices have increased faster th…

The F-150 is the lowest cost full size pickup truck Ford makes. If you can't put full sheets of plywood and 2x4s in it, it's not really a pickup truck. How Much Does the Ford F-150 Cost? The 2022 Ford F-150 starts at $29,990, which is the lowest base price in the full-size pickup truck segment. However, that's for the three-seat Regular Cab, so if you're looking for more room, take note of the Super Cab's $34,075 bas…

The cheapest F-100 also had a short bed, so it wasn’t a real pickup truck either. You had a pay a whole $35 extra to get the long one!

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#257

Post by ALittleLight » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:24 AM UTC

unity1001 wrote: post #238

beerdoggie wrote: post #54

In California, people fitting certain economic criteria are now being issued $1000 checks for inflation relief. This is beyond ludicrous. We have printed so much money, the only solution is to... print more? It's almost like it is all a sneaky backdoor to letting the government redistribute wealth without real oversight...

> In California, people fitting certain economic criteria are now being issued $1000 checks for inflation relief. This is beyond ludicrous. Its not. Its happening in Europe too. Its a way to try to get people through the winter and avoid the energy crisis impacting ordinary people. That's what a government should do - take care of its people during extraordinary times.

That doesn't make sense though. You can't create energy by printing money. You just redistribute the value of your money. Maybe that's good - not clear to me why it's better to use inflation, which risks destabilizing the currency and punishes people who saved money, rather than straightforward taxes.

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#258

Post by jbm » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:25 AM UTC

lmm wrote: post #184

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>That does imply that you might consider some backup energy solutions for the winter. I'm a fan of kerosene lately. Less annoying to use than propane, and stores almost as well. By backup you mean for heating? Can you safely burn kerosene indoors? I thought you would have all sort of pollutants on top of monoxide?

"Safely" is relative, but here in Japan kerosene heaters are totally normal in older homes.

Those homes are also poorly insulated, and probably let gasses out much more easily than modern well-sealed homes. I didn't see kerosene heaters in new homes in Japan, probably for the same reason.

As such, I would be hesitant to use a kerosene heater in my home without investigating it in much more detail.

(It's a theoretical issue for me as my geographical area has more NG than it can use)

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#259

Post by wahnfrieden » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:26 AM UTC

bcrosby95 wrote: post #215

Syonyk wrote: post #21

> But if the main driver of inflation is the demand side, or inflation expectations, history indicates that a painful recession could be the only way to curb inflation. That's certainly the expected path forward, at least in the circles I associate with. "When the tide goes out, you find out who's swimming naked" seems a reasonable guess as to what's going to happen. Both at larger bank/investment firm scale and at t…

I went into college during the dotcom bust. Everyone told me I would be making peanuts. I'm pretty happy where I am. I've lived my life trying to minimize the financial downsides. I want money for security, not to live the high life. I like my job, and don't feel the need to retire early - I would love to do it until I'm 6 feet under. I make a decent enough income, although not the level of many here. I bought a mode…

I experienced the same and I’ve probably enjoyed similar extremely cushy tech career experiences that also aren’t that relevant to a macro discussion but it’s nice to hear individual anecdotes

Re: Inflation is at a 40 year high. What can history teach us?

#260

Post by fshbbdssbbgdd » Wed, Oct 05, 2022, 4:27 AM UTC

csomar wrote: post #196

mrep wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you at? I ask because I have 2 mortgages and a car loan in the US and 2 are fixed rate for the entire lifetime of the loan and 1 I have 10 years until the ARM starts applying so I'm laughing all the way to the bank. 90% of US mortgages are fixed for the entire loan.

There is no fixed rate loan. It's all variable. There is a trader (might be the bank) that is buying variable rate and selling you a fixed rate. If he goes bankrupt, somebody will be holding the bag. You might want to re-read your terms if the interest rates get much higher.

I read my mortgage and there’s nothing in there that entitles the lender to raise the rate in any circumstances.

The interest-rate risk is on whoever owns the bonds to that ultimately funded the mortgage. The value of those bonds is going down as interest rates rise.