Live data from Hacker News

Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

theguardian.com

21–30 of 316 posts

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#21
It's yet another example of the gap that always exists between economic theory and economic practice. In this case, what we have is that every player in the food chain has taken advantage of supply shortage to eke out additional margin along the way. And why not? Your products are in demand and there are buyers who are willing to pay more than the theoretical market price. The actual situation is that even if competition does assert itself eventually it is slow to adjust to changes in the environment AND there is very strong hysteresis: those with the opportunity are fast to put up prices and slow to lower them again to the same level even if prior conditions re-establish themselves.

Most of it goes to the lie that is the premise that interest rates are really the optimal way to control inflation, regardless of the source. When inflation is actually driven by consumers having too much money, fine, go for it. But when its driven by external factors all you are doing is causing misery and maybe adding fuel to the fire as people already maxed out buying essentials are in fact going to seek (require) higher salaries when you add to their cost of living.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#22
post #17

Here is the "analysis" in question: https://australiainstitute.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/02... It never actually explains what exactly a "profit-price spiral" is. Even if company profits are to blame for inflation, the only solution that central bankers have at their disposal is to increase interest rates to cool aggregate demand. This is why we leave central banking to technocrats rather than people with a poli…

The Australia Institute is a thinktank, funded by the Greens.

The conclusion is already foregone, they work backwards from there, it's like asking ASPI about defense spending.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#23
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. That’s well known bunk from alt-economics. Convenient to Austrians and Libertarians who get to blame the government (again), but wrong. Money supply is only one factor in a complex system.

Maybe it’s not the only factor but surely it’s the major factor right now? Sure, we had a supply shock, but then we printed the most currency in history and got soaring inflation.

We also "printed the most currency in history" in years we didn't get soaring inflation...

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#24
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time your local bank issues a loan, it creates money out of thin air.

The banks are only allowed to loan a certain amount. The department that prints mone6 is the same department that regulates how much can be lent by all banks (in the US), so it is the same type of "creating money" as printing money is. And is accounted for when calculating "how much money is in circulation"

It's called a reserve requirement ratio (RRR), the bank must hold a certain percentage of loans as cash. It's mostly a closed loop due to rehypothecation so money supply is proportional to RRR. It keeps getting cut and it's one of those expansionary policies you tend not to hear much about. It's been a long time since I paid attention to it but I think there was talk of using cash equivalents instead of just cash at which point given the fraudulent incompetence of rating agencies you might as well not have a RRR.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#25

Same thing happening in Canada https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-loblaw-earn...

Its called a scapegoat.

The Canadian government massively expanded the money supply and took on a ton of debt giving payments during Covid.

Even the BoC was caught off guard when they said “inflation was transitory”.

Rather than admit it was their own policies that caused inflation they’ve decided to blame industry.

Don't get me wrong, profit is going up for these industries, some of it driven by supply issues. You could argue that higher profit is helping sustain inflation (costs go up -> wages goes up -> costs go up -> etc), but higher profit is NOT the reason why inflation spike in the first place.

Its quite entertaining to see but no doubt it’ll work on most of the population.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#26
post #21

It's yet another example of the gap that always exists between economic theory and economic practice. In this case, what we have is that every player in the food chain has taken advantage of supply shortage to eke out additional margin along the way. And why not? Your products are in demand and there are buyers who are willing to pay more than the theoretical market price. The actual situation is that even if competi…

It's also important to note that growing wealth inequality means you need to seduce fewer customers with these higher prices. It's most obvious with America's pharma industry where the cost to produce seriously outstrips the retail value and the market has zero incentive to make costs obvious and a whole insurance industry and it's companies are the buyers, not the individuals.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#27
post #21

It's yet another example of the gap that always exists between economic theory and economic practice. In this case, what we have is that every player in the food chain has taken advantage of supply shortage to eke out additional margin along the way. And why not? Your products are in demand and there are buyers who are willing to pay more than the theoretical market price. The actual situation is that even if competi…

Similarly lowering interest rates into the ground when consumers still had plenty of money but supply was constrained probably wasn't a wise move either.

More targeted assistance of just affected industries during the pandemic could have prevented almost all of this.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#28
post #17

Here is the "analysis" in question: https://australiainstitute.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/02... It never actually explains what exactly a "profit-price spiral" is. Even if company profits are to blame for inflation, the only solution that central bankers have at their disposal is to increase interest rates to cool aggregate demand. This is why we leave central banking to technocrats rather than people with a poli…

The Australia Institute is a thinktank, funded by the Greens. The conclusion is already foregone, they work backwards from there, it's like asking ASPI about defense spending.

> Australia Institute is a thinktank, funded by the Greens

Source? If true, this doesn’t belong on HN.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#29
post #21

It's yet another example of the gap that always exists between economic theory and economic practice. In this case, what we have is that every player in the food chain has taken advantage of supply shortage to eke out additional margin along the way. And why not? Your products are in demand and there are buyers who are willing to pay more than the theoretical market price. The actual situation is that even if competi…

The other factor is that unchecked consolidation of almost all industries eliminated the “animal spirits” of competition to lower prices.

You see this with gasoline. Refining production is so limited that it takes weeks or months to recover from a price spike.

Re: Analysis finds Australia’s inflation being driven by company profits, not wages

#30
post #21

It's yet another example of the gap that always exists between economic theory and economic practice. In this case, what we have is that every player in the food chain has taken advantage of supply shortage to eke out additional margin along the way. And why not? Your products are in demand and there are buyers who are willing to pay more than the theoretical market price. The actual situation is that even if competi…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN