3 ms·

> on the BLS website This is begging the question though. If the problem is BLS, then using BLS as a reference that BLS isn't the problem is blatantly fallaci

> on the BLS website This is begging the question though. If the problem is BLS, then using BLS as a reference that BLS isn't the problem is blatantly fallacious. The claim is that BLS is deceiving us... so it doesn't make any sense to use them to adjudicate whether they're deceiving us or not. You see the problem right?

mikeyouse 4y ago
No. Because the BLS publishes their methodology, back tests it, and compares it to other weights and methodologies (which they publish full datasets for). You can then compare it to other independent measurements like the MIT Billion Prices Project and see that over an 8-year period, the BLS measurements differ from public pricing info by less than 1% which is less than 1/10th of a percent per year. http://www.thebillionpricesproject.com/datasets/ http://www.thebillionpricesproject.com/datasets/ There certainly is room for measurement error in something as complex as an inflation index that takes into account so many data points and weights, but the answer to resolve that complexity isn't "trust grifters selling newsletters to goldbugs".
- guerrilla 4y ago
  Yes. They didn't refer to the MIT Billion Prices Project, they refereed to BLS itself, to debunk the claim that they "misused cover of academic theory" unlike what you did. You can't just say someone didn't fail epistemically just because you, 10 minutes later, didn't.
  - mikeyouse 4y ago
    Meh, this is just a different form of an ad hominem... There are literally hundreds of pages of documents written about CPI justification and process, and several documents specifically showing how Shadowstats is garbage (e.g. https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/08/art1full.pdf https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/08/art1full.pdf). Take quarrel with the actual research instead of the domain they're hosted on since as OP pointed out, many of them are published by third party academics with no financial or institutional connection to the BLS.
staticman2 4y ago
We know Shadowstats is decieving us because they don't measure inflation, just add numbers to the official inflation numbers. You can read more about it if you google the topic. For example: https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1025266&sid=b1a5cc26b6c196010e544a4d3139413d#p1025266 https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1025266&sid... In a more pragmatic sense, if you can't be bothered to learn enough economics to evaluate the official number (which is understandable) going with the group that sounds crazy is a bad idea. This author talks about outside view dismissals being a valid form of evaluating a claim in the context of a cult: "But the outside view tells you something different. These people are wearing funny robes and beads, they live in a remote compound, and they speak in unison in a really creepy way. Even though their arguments are irrefutable, everything in your experience tells you you're dealing with a cult. Of course, they have a brilliant argument for why you should ignore those instincts, but that's the inside view talking. The outside view doesn't care about content, it sees the form and the context, and it doesn't look good." https://idlewords.com/talks/superintelligence.htm https://idlewords.com/talks/superintelligence.htm

mikeyouse 4y ago

No. Because the BLS publishes their methodology, back tests it, and compares it to other weights and methodologies (which they publish full datasets for). You can then compare it to other independent measurements like the MIT Billion Prices Project and see that over an 8-year period, the BLS measurements differ from public pricing info by less than 1% which is less than 1/10th of a percent per year. http://www.thebillionpricesproject.com/datasets/ http://www.thebillionpricesproject.com/datasets/ There certainly is room for measurement error in something as complex as an inflation index that takes into account so many data points and weights, but the answer to resolve that complexity isn't "trust grifters selling newsletters to goldbugs".

guerrilla 4y ago
Yes. They didn't refer to the MIT Billion Prices Project, they refereed to BLS itself, to debunk the claim that they "misused cover of academic theory" unlike what you did. You can't just say someone didn't fail epistemically just because you, 10 minutes later, didn't.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  Meh, this is just a different form of an ad hominem... There are literally hundreds of pages of documents written about CPI justification and process, and several documents specifically showing how Shadowstats is garbage (e.g. https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/08/art1full.pdf https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/08/art1full.pdf). Take quarrel with the actual research instead of the domain they're hosted on since as OP pointed out, many of them are published by third party academics with no financial or institutional connection to the BLS.

staticman2 4y ago

We know Shadowstats is decieving us because they don't measure inflation, just add numbers to the official inflation numbers. You can read more about it if you google the topic. For example: https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1025266&sid=b1a5cc26b6c196010e544a4d3139413d#p1025266 https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1025266&sid... In a more pragmatic sense, if you can't be bothered to learn enough economics to evaluate the official number (which is understandable) going with the group that sounds crazy is a bad idea. This author talks about outside view dismissals being a valid form of evaluating a claim in the context of a cult: "But the outside view tells you something different. These people are wearing funny robes and beads, they live in a remote compound, and they speak in unison in a really creepy way. Even though their arguments are irrefutable, everything in your experience tells you you're dealing with a cult. Of course, they have a brilliant argument for why you should ignore those instincts, but that's the inside view talking. The outside view doesn't care about content, it sees the form and the context, and it doesn't look good." https://idlewords.com/talks/superintelligence.htm https://idlewords.com/talks/superintelligence.htm