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You're both incorrect. Poor people are affected by the ratio of price inflation to wage inflation, which is for the first time in ~50 years flipped such that w

by xapata 5y ago

You're both incorrect. Poor people are affected by the ratio of price inflation to wage inflation, which is for the first time in ~50 years flipped such that wages are growing faster than prices. Inflation transfers money from creditors to debtors, to the extent it's a surprise. Interest rates and origination fees incorporate risk of inflation. The US government is in debt to US treasury bill holders. You could say inflation is a wealth transfer from T-bill holders to the government, but the buyers of T-bills knew the risks and made their choices. Maybe they've even hedged. Poor people have credit card debt, payday loan debt, medical debt, etc. I wouldn't say housing is exclusive to the upper middle class, because 65% of Americans own houses. That seems like a low bar for "upper" class.

antisthenes 5y ago
> which is for the first time in ~50 years flipped such that wages are growing faster than prices. > Real average hourly earnings decreased 1.9 percent, seasonally adjusted, from November 2020 to November 2021. The change in real average hourly earnings combined with no change in the average workweek resulted in a 1.9-percent decrease in real average weekly earnings over this period. Good try, but incorrect.
- xapata 5y ago
  Check the same value since November 2019. I can't find the figures now, but I'm hopeful the gains weren't wiped out.
VirusNewbie 5y ago
Who do you think has more debt in absolute terms, the lower class or the upper class? Whose debt is primarily leveraged into income producing assets opposed to simply debt? It doesn't matter if every single person in the US has debt and inflation makes that cheaper, if it disproportionally wipes out upper class debt you're doing wealth transfer indirectly to the upper class.
- xapata 5y ago
  Good point. However, we care more about marginal value for an individual. A dollar given to a poor person is more valuable than a dollar given to a wealthy person. Giving $10 to Elon Musk accompanied by $1 to, well, just about anyone else, would increase equity, because we would value the $1 more than ten-fold what Musk would. Those particular numbers might be incorrect for the example, but the principle holds. That's why we have progressive tax brackets.
  - VirusNewbie 5y ago
    > Giving $10 to Elon Musk accompanied by $1 to, well, just about anyone else, would increase equity, It literally would do the opposite, literally. Do you know what the word equity means? You might say it's the right thing to do ethically, that it's a trade off you might make, and we can get into all sorts of pros and cons of it, but it is the opposite of increasing equity.

by xapata 5y ago

antisthenes 5y ago

> which is for the first time in ~50 years flipped such that wages are growing faster than prices. > Real average hourly earnings decreased 1.9 percent, seasonally adjusted, from November 2020 to November 2021. The change in real average hourly earnings combined with no change in the average workweek resulted in a 1.9-percent decrease in real average weekly earnings over this period. Good try, but incorrect.

xapata 5y ago
Check the same value since November 2019. I can't find the figures now, but I'm hopeful the gains weren't wiped out.

VirusNewbie 5y ago

Who do you think has more debt in absolute terms, the lower class or the upper class? Whose debt is primarily leveraged into income producing assets opposed to simply debt? It doesn't matter if every single person in the US has debt and inflation makes that cheaper, if it disproportionally wipes out upper class debt you're doing wealth transfer indirectly to the upper class.

xapata 5y ago
Good point. However, we care more about marginal value for an individual. A dollar given to a poor person is more valuable than a dollar given to a wealthy person. Giving $10 to Elon Musk accompanied by $1 to, well, just about anyone else, would increase equity, because we would value the $1 more than ten-fold what Musk would. Those particular numbers might be incorrect for the example, but the principle holds. That's why we have progressive tax brackets.
- VirusNewbie 5y ago
  > Giving $10 to Elon Musk accompanied by $1 to, well, just about anyone else, would increase equity, It literally would do the opposite, literally. Do you know what the word equity means? You might say it's the right thing to do ethically, that it's a trade off you might make, and we can get into all sorts of pros and cons of it, but it is the opposite of increasing equity.