As I wrote, that's what everyone tries to do (e.g., businesses lay off employees, try to raise prices, and hoard inventory), but in the aggregate it's impossibl

As I wrote, that's what everyone tries to do (e.g., businesses lay off employees, try to raise prices, and hoard inventory), but in the aggregate it's impossible for everyone simultaneously to cut spending, increase earnings, and hoard more stuff as the currency loses value. The sum of all individual decisions, which may seem rational to each person or business, add up to aggregate behavior that in hindsight proves counter-productive to economic stability. As Keynes put it, "the process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose." Speaking from personal experience, I think he was spot-on.