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> If consumers expect future price drops, demand can dip significantly and induce further drops in price Sounds awesome? Saves resources. People save money for

> If consumers expect future price drops, demand can dip significantly and induce further drops in price Sounds awesome? Saves resources. People save money for a rainy day. Lending goes down.

stopping 4y ago
Not at all. The issue of rampant consumerism is mostly orthogonal to issues of overall economic stability. Deflation will certainly reduce consumption, but at the cost of massive societal upheaval by way of extreme unemployment and all of its ill effects.
imtringued 4y ago
Money is necessary to conduct transactions. If people are incapable of transacting because some people play a hoarding game like with Bitcoin then real people's real basic needs like food or housing won't be met. You will get wholly pointless homelessness. How do we make sure that money cannot be abused to doom the rest of the economy into an inability to transact? You make people pay for the benefits they receive by holding onto money. People hate free markets, they are against paying for the costs they cause.
- randomdata 4y ago
  > Money is necessary to conduct transactions. Not necessarily. Money is little more than a distributed IOU held from providing past benefit to someone else to be used in exchange for future benefit from someone else. Money records that I did work for you now and in return you will do work for me later, except given that the IOU is recognized in a distributed fashion the work later can also come from other people. IOUs bring a lot of benefit, but aren't strictly necessary to conduct a transaction. I could work for you now and at the same time you could work for me to provide equal value. Since there is no delay between services rendered there is no need to record that the other party promises to provide a future benefit. The transaction is already complete in the moment.
KptMarchewa 4y ago
And you get fired from your job because demand for it disappears. Amazing.
- autoexec 4y ago
  Demand doesn't disappear. People still want the things they want. They just might not be wiling to pay as much as others would like them to. Lower the prices, and suddenly those people can justify (or even simply afford) satisfing the demand that never went away. People spending leads to more jobs.
  - KptMarchewa 4y ago
    >Lower the prices, and suddenly those people can justify (or even simply afford) satisfing the demand that never went away. Or they can wait more to buy cheaper. Sure, they won't do that if you sell carrots, but they will do if you sell cars.
    - autoexec 4y ago
      As if prices are going to come down. If the companies who have been making record profits refuse to accept making a little less profit and won't lower prices how long will you have to wait to buy something cheaper.

> If consumers expect future price drops, demand can dip significantly and induce further drops in price Sounds awesome? Saves resources. People save money for a rainy day. Lending goes down.

stopping 4y ago

Not at all. The issue of rampant consumerism is mostly orthogonal to issues of overall economic stability. Deflation will certainly reduce consumption, but at the cost of massive societal upheaval by way of extreme unemployment and all of its ill effects.

imtringued 4y ago

Money is necessary to conduct transactions. If people are incapable of transacting because some people play a hoarding game like with Bitcoin then real people's real basic needs like food or housing won't be met. You will get wholly pointless homelessness. How do we make sure that money cannot be abused to doom the rest of the economy into an inability to transact? You make people pay for the benefits they receive by holding onto money. People hate free markets, they are against paying for the costs they cause.

randomdata 4y ago
> Money is necessary to conduct transactions. Not necessarily. Money is little more than a distributed IOU held from providing past benefit to someone else to be used in exchange for future benefit from someone else. Money records that I did work for you now and in return you will do work for me later, except given that the IOU is recognized in a distributed fashion the work later can also come from other people. IOUs bring a lot of benefit, but aren't strictly necessary to conduct a transaction. I could work for you now and at the same time you could work for me to provide equal value. Since there is no delay between services rendered there is no need to record that the other party promises to provide a future benefit. The transaction is already complete in the moment.

KptMarchewa 4y ago

And you get fired from your job because demand for it disappears. Amazing.

autoexec 4y ago
Demand doesn't disappear. People still want the things they want. They just might not be wiling to pay as much as others would like them to. Lower the prices, and suddenly those people can justify (or even simply afford) satisfing the demand that never went away. People spending leads to more jobs.
- KptMarchewa 4y ago
  >Lower the prices, and suddenly those people can justify (or even simply afford) satisfing the demand that never went away. Or they can wait more to buy cheaper. Sure, they won't do that if you sell carrots, but they will do if you sell cars.
  - autoexec 4y ago
    As if prices are going to come down. If the companies who have been making record profits refuse to accept making a little less profit and won't lower prices how long will you have to wait to buy something cheaper.