41–50 of 80 posts
I question the accuracy. In 2010 I could buy a McDonald's double cheeseburger for $1. Now they're like $3 and they took off a slice of cheese.
You know what, it's not as bad as I was thinking.
For me it's the opposite. I am a bit surprised that inflation halved buying power since 2000. In my mind those level of interest usually come from the stock market or house appreciation, but I guess those are much faster (I seem to recall doubling every 8 years in the stock market and housing being a bit slower).
I question the accuracy. In 2010 I could buy a McDonald's double cheeseburger for $1. Now they're like $3 and they took off a slice of cheese.
This isn't very surprising. Typical US economic policy aims for 2-3% annual inflation. That counter shows an average 2.6% inflation across 26 years, which is kind of right in the range we'd expect. It's debatable whether this is good longterm policy - but it's been the norm in the US for decades.
> Typical US economic policy aims for 2-3% annual inflation. That counter shows an average 2.6% inflation across 26 years, which is kind of right in the range we'd expect We aim for "inflation of 2 percent over the longer run, as measured by the annual change in the price index for personal consumption expenditures" [1]. [1] https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/economy_14400.htm
How closely does that track with CPI-U, which is the index this web site is using? If I believe Gemini, PCE should show a slightly lower inflation number?
I question the accuracy. In 2010 I could buy a McDonald's double cheeseburger for $1. Now they're like $3 and they took off a slice of cheese.
The author just discovered the meaning of inflation? What matters (for living standards) is that real wages and GDP grew over the same period.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a problem that our society is designed for and judged in relation to capital. Most people are paid in dollars, not shares of the S&P 500. 38% of the population doesn't even own any stocks[1]. We can't act like the dropping dollar value is fine simply because stock investments are outpacing those losses. Maybe that tradeoff benefits the people reading this, but it hurts a huge number of Americans. [1] - https://n…
> It's a problem that our society is designed for and judged in relation to capital. Cash is also capital. If you were trying to say it’s a problem that our economic system favors deploying capital into investments instead of hoarding cash, I disagree. An economy where everyone is incentivized to hoarde cash instead of deploying it to investments doesn’t progress because the smartest thing you could do with your mone…
It's funny you say this and also this:
>You’re conflating income and savings.
You're doing the same thing.
The problem I was hitting on is that large portions of our population don't have any investments are therefore are being left further behind by this tradeoff of stocks in favor of cash. You can't just tell people not to leave their cash sitting around when they don't actually have any cash sitting around.
I question the accuracy. In 2010 I could buy a McDonald's double cheeseburger for $1. Now they're like $3 and they took off a slice of cheese.
And you're right, the food has gotten worse as well.
The real time number isn't as interesting as the potential future number. If the dollar stops being the reserve currency, the purchasing power of the dollar will crash. No more cheap borrowing, no more low interest rates, hello constant high inflation. The Iran war has made that increasingly likely to happen. It may even have been intentional. https://www.jpmorgan.com/insights/global-research/currencies... | https://…
And thus manufacturing will return to the US! I thought we wanted that. It's the only way out of the Triffin dilemma.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Healthcare and housing being two big ones Almost all BLS price indices, including CPI, include housing. (CPI measures the “rent of primary residence, owners' equivalent rent, utilities, bedroom furniture” [1].) That said, this is the second time I've come across this myth on HN in less than a week. Where did you hear that price indices don't track healthcare and housing costs? [1] https://www.bls.gov/opub/hom/cpi/c…
The point isn't that CPI excludes healthcare and housing, CPI shelter sub-index https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SAH1 and the medical care sub-index https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SAM2 have grown ~500% and ~770% respectively in the same time frame. The _overall_ CPI they are blended into grew ~300%, which means real wages are deflated. So if personal spending is weighted towards healthcare and h…
If you spend a third of your income on housing and 8% on healthcare [1], then those components–assuming your 5x and 7.7x multiples–will raise your cost of living by 2.25x. That leaves 1.75x for the other components (to get to the overall 3x). That sounds reasonable as a median estimate.
> if personal spending is weighted towards healthcare and housing (anyone who rents or pays a mortgage below a certain income) then your purchasing power is declining faster than the real wage would suggest
Sure. If you spend a lot on imported dates, your purchasing power will currently be declining faster than the median American's. This is a problem. But it's almost by definition not one that can be widespread.
> the "real wage" is inflated relative to the lived experience of those people
Well, yes. There are regional CPIs and income-indexed CPIs and all manners of privately-calculated costs of living. Paying attention to lived experiences or whatever is important, especially in politics. But it's no substitute for broad measures when conducting a national economy.
[2] https://www.bls.gov/opub/btn/volume-9/how-have-healthcare-ex...