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Most folks on HN aren't old enough to remember inflation as an adult and it's effects but I am. Nothing in my life hurt more people than inflation. If you wer
by rmason 5y ago
Most folks on HN aren't old enough to remember inflation as an adult and it's effects but I am.
Nothing in my life hurt more people than inflation. If you were older and on a fixed income you were screwed, folks had to sell their possessions to survive. I remember farmers paying 20% interest to get loans for fertilizer, fuel and seed to plant their crop. The average person overnight had less buying power.
The only people who benefited were the rich. If they owned land or buildings the prices shot up. If they were highly leveraged they could pay off their loans with cheaper dollars. If they were in business they could raise prices on what they sold and pass along the cost to someone else.
- xapata 5y ago40 years ago, there were many fewer stock market participants, and many more retirees on fixed income. Now it's relatively rare to retire with a fixed-income pension. More of us are shareholders now, with IRAs and 401ks.
- ledauphin 5y agomost of _us_, I can easily believe. But most _people_ in the Western world? I'd like to see some references.
- xapata 5y agoI don't know about the "Western world" but in the US stock ownership is dramatically more prevalent. At the same time, pension plans have nearly disappeared in the private sector. The ownership rates are trivially searchable. The 2nd link I found was a Gallup survey that estimated around 60% of US residents, which is roughly 1.5x the portion that have a college degree. If you're thinking of the poor, Social Security payments increase with inflation, so they're not quite fixed-income.