201–210 of 412 posts
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>weren't we suppose to be staring at empty shelves, house arrest, fire and brimstone / dogs and cats living together by now? What are you even talking about?
Everything everywhere since late 2015 or so.
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In the end, it won't matter. Only economists, policy makers, investors and people blabbing on the internet do care about stats. Ordinary people just look at price tags; that's all they need.
It's nice to have agreed-upon, citable facts though, even if only so that voters know who's full of crap during a debate. When the next R candidate says that Trump handled inflation beautifully, it's important to be able to point to an authoritative source that shows that that claim is BS.
Are there inflation indicators that aren’t government controlled? Don’t think anything coming out of trump influenced bodies is worth the paper it’s on anymore
The purchasing power of Gold has been remarkably consistent over the long term.
That is, if you convert the gold to dollars, how many eggs could you buy?
To learn more, read up on the work of Keith Weiner of Monetary Metals, or listen to the early episodes of his podcast “The Gold Exchange”.
Over the years I have read a few articles or blogs that make the argument that if government inflation figures in the US were calculated as they do in Europe, then our reported US inflation figures would be much higher. Can anyone here verify this? Our main problems involve under the table unreported to the public military expenditures. If you look at a map of our military bases, we have many bordering China. I think…
> Over the years I have read a few articles or blogs Without linking the blogs or articles it’s hard to say much. Inflation is a topic that attracts a lot of quackery. There are a lot of blogs and websites that go viral from time to time with claims that the “true” inflation number is dramatically higher. There is a quick reality check you should run whenever you encounter these claims: Take the claimed inflation num…
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I don't think any existing numbers were officially changed, just that the head of BLS was fired.
Yes, for THAT head of the BLS. It is super clear to the next head of the BLS that they deliver the number the president likes or they will be fired. So, just like in Venezuela, that number will be delivered.
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Certainly. So would materials expenses and theft and insurance and so forth. But the confusion is that somehow, money not spent on “salaries and compensation” doesn’t go to people. All of it goes to people. Defense spending isn’t buying “defense”, it’s buying time and effort for people to focus on and produce defense related things. This is the root of the original post that defense spending is a jobs program.
> All of it goes to people That's just straight up false. It goes to legal entities, some of which are people. Companies aren't people mate, and neither are investment funds. The money might still be managed by people, but that cannot be called salary, even if you're stretching the definition.
Over the years I have read a few articles or blogs that make the argument that if government inflation figures in the US were calculated as they do in Europe, then our reported US inflation figures would be much higher. Can anyone here verify this? Our main problems involve under the table unreported to the public military expenditures. If you look at a map of our military bases, we have many bordering China. I think…
> Over the years I have read a few articles or blogs Without linking the blogs or articles it’s hard to say much. Inflation is a topic that attracts a lot of quackery. There are a lot of blogs and websites that go viral from time to time with claims that the “true” inflation number is dramatically higher. There is a quick reality check you should run whenever you encounter these claims: Take the claimed inflation num…
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Because business is not a single monolith, and because it is greedy, it kills the naive idea that "businesses raise prices because they can". Any gouging price increase is a gaping hole for a competitor (businesses are greedy and therefore will take money from other businesses) to come in and steal business. This is something that is obvious to people who have been on the business side and mostly opaque to people who…
I'll hold my breath for the fast food chain that lowers its prices to better compete with the chains that raised theirs. We have plenty of examples, with documentation and receipts, of businesses participating in price fixing, collusion, and other cooperative behaviors that result in higher prices for consumers and reduced competition between businesses. You are naively assuming that all businesses express greed in t…
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All spending everywhere is essentially “salaries and compensation”. It’s not like you get to the end of the supply chain and suddenly are paying God. Money always goes to people.
I don't agree. If I dig a hole in my yard and find a huge chunk of gold, when I sell it very little of what I charge will be for my labor. Also, even if you're right, the "salaries and compensation" of anyone outside the U.S. are effectively NOT that, since the thing in question is whether defense spending is mostly a jobs program.
No, almost all of it would cover your labor.
What you are describing is winning the lottery, which isn't really useful since it is a rounding error of possible scenarios. A "Having a career is meaningless because you can just win the lotto instead" kind of scenario.
In reality you would be digging for ages in your yard to find a nugget of gold. If you went to a place with gold to dig, you would be a gold miner, and no, it's not easy money, go ask them.
Over the years I have read a few articles or blogs that make the argument that if government inflation figures in the US were calculated as they do in Europe, then our reported US inflation figures would be much higher. Can anyone here verify this? Our main problems involve under the table unreported to the public military expenditures. If you look at a map of our military bases, we have many bordering China. I think…
Fred has the data: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CP0000EZ19M086NEST# https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/SUUR0000SA0 I’m driving, it’s difficult to put them on the same chart and normalize. But they are very similar. There are differences in methodology (housing, healthcare) but those generally add a small amount to US inflation chained index vs HICP.