5 ms·

> 2. The government decides that, oops, it printed too much money in 2020/21 and is causing inflation, so it raises rates very quickly. Printing money doesn’t

by mo_42 4y ago

> 2. The government decides that, oops, it printed too much money in 2020/21 and is causing inflation, so it raises rates very quickly. Printing money doesn’t cause inflation necessarily. Your thinking is based on Monetarism, which has been debunked a while ago. In essence, it’s not about the amount of money that is created. It's about the amount of goods we try to consume in relation to the amount of goods produced.

RangerScience 4y ago
There's a pretty excellent and rather indie board game called "Wealth of Nations". If you squint, it's a bit like what you wish Catan was, after you've played Catan for awhile. Players make resources, then re-invest those resources to expand. There's markets to buy and sell resources, and otherwise money isn't part of the game... until someone makes banks, and starts printing money. At which point everyone watches the prices of everything go up. It's a pretty cool microcosm.
puzzlingcaptcha 4y ago
How do you debunk a theory in a field that doesn't allow for a hypothesis to be tested? Economics is just navel-gazing.
- hanselot 4y ago
  The same way you prebunk things in our modern world. If the information does not fit the narrative, the information must be fake... How else will we ensure the safety of our elections and democracy? Don't you know democracy dies in the dark? Don't you know that this is extremely dangerous for our democracy? Edit: BTW, nothing against what you said, economics seems very similar to the Agile cult to me at this point.
- mo_42 4y ago
  As in any other scientific field: you put forward a theory and if there is enough evidence that does not fit the theory it’s debunked. In economics, "enough" is hard to assess though. Also, a theory may linger around for a while because it suits the agenda of some people. And I guess many more methodical issues like these.
kavalg 4y ago
Consumption is driven by the availability of money in the form of income/stimulus or credit.
pixelfarmer 4y ago
Exactly. It can also easily be seen via stock indices, the likes of S&P 500 and similar. The general curve is "exponentially upwards", which implies that someone somewhere must make money available in the very same fashion. Now, looking at fiat money I think it is clear how that comes to be, but that also means that all this fake money -- technically massive amounts of debt piled on debt, plus interest on all of it -- is aplenty. As you wrote, it was the hickups in the actual economy which caused the price hike, and with all that "money" available it was also clear that this inflation wouldn't go down anytime soon as so called "experts" were talking about initially. In fact, it is a wonderful dumping ground for all this junk in the stock market, although by now it is more of a trickle in relation to the amounts piled up there ...
thworp 4y ago
You can only say that once you accept inflation to mean "a single number representing price increases", which is so over-simplified as to be laughable. Not to mention easily manipulated by statistical tricks and more obvious tricks like weighing for "feature increase" or using country-wide medians and not weighing those for population distribution. If you look at real estate prices vs CPI since MMT really began, real estate grew much faster than CPI, in some cities over twice as fast. That is a direct result of all the excess money that wasn't needed for productive endeavours finding a "safe" place to be parked. Similarly having bonds yield below even the cooked inflation number forces safe traditional investors like pension funds to chase stock market returns which was a large contributor to the gigantic bubble that is now popping. Redefining inflation to mean consumer price increase was a very sneaky move to be sure. A hundred years ago your statement would have been read as "inflation doesn't cause inflation" since it meant any expansion of the money supply.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  > as "inflation doesn't cause inflation" since it meant any expansion of the money supply. Since 1950's, population has doubled and GDP is up 10x. What should money supply be for it to cause zero inflation? 1x? 2x? 10x?
  - thworp 4y ago
    I don't know, but I do strongly believe that the "conventional wisdom" that deflation is a horrible phenomenon that leads to a decades-long depression is bullshit. The entire process of industrialization was hugely deflationary Yet still the 1800s were the first time in history where quality of life for the average Joe improved by leaps and bounds. Diet, medicine, child mortality, wealth all started improving exponentially. Meanwhile under the monetary alchemists and "stabilizing" regime of central banks real wages have stagnated, crises still occur every 10 years and the entire system is so fragile that one major event could collapse the whole house of cards.
    - SgtBastard 4y ago
      >The entire process of industrialization was hugely deflationary Prices definitely lowered, but the difference being that while there was also supplier upheaval as artisan/bespoke producers were replaced by mass production - the industrialists were enormously and sustainably profitable and could in turn employ those displaced from the failed producers. Aggregate demand arguably increased with the move of labour from rural agriculture to urban manufacturing. A deflationary cycle annihilates demand by definition and fixed costs then eat producers alive - leading to wealth destruction, unemployment, debt writeoffs and credit tightening. Which in turn leads to more demand annihilation.
parineum 4y ago
Printing money causing inflation has got to be one of the simplest things in economics to understand. Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. And what's your source on Monetarism being debunked, the people printing currency? It's pretty strange how, when all the money was being printed, it wasn't that hard to find a plethora of economists warning that it would cause inflation (due to Monetarism principles) and then, now that inflation is rampant, that's not seen as evidence to the theory. Furthermore, change the interest rates to curb inflation is exactly in-line with that theory because higher interest rates cause people to take their inflated currency out of circulation and into savings.
- matwood 4y ago
  > Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. So as the supply chain continues to improve, prices should come down? Inflation is too much money, chasing too few goods. It's the push/pull between money supply and goods in the market that drives inflation. Money can't be talked about in a vacuum.
  - argentinian 4y ago
    > So as the supply chain continues to improve, prices should come down? That's very often the case.
- em500 4y ago
  > Printing money causing inflation has got to be one of the simplest things in economics to understand. Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. One more easy things in economics to understand is that your second sentence is only true if demand is assumed to be constant.
argentinian 4y ago
In Argentina, with our inflation over 100% a year, arguments like yours are very common. e.g. https://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/economia/2-190369-2012-03-25.html https://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/economia/2-190369-2012-03...

by mo_42 4y ago

RangerScience 4y ago

There's a pretty excellent and rather indie board game called "Wealth of Nations". If you squint, it's a bit like what you wish Catan was, after you've played Catan for awhile. Players make resources, then re-invest those resources to expand. There's markets to buy and sell resources, and otherwise money isn't part of the game... until someone makes banks, and starts printing money. At which point everyone watches the prices of everything go up. It's a pretty cool microcosm.

puzzlingcaptcha 4y ago

How do you debunk a theory in a field that doesn't allow for a hypothesis to be tested? Economics is just navel-gazing.

hanselot 4y ago
The same way you prebunk things in our modern world. If the information does not fit the narrative, the information must be fake... How else will we ensure the safety of our elections and democracy? Don't you know democracy dies in the dark? Don't you know that this is extremely dangerous for our democracy? Edit: BTW, nothing against what you said, economics seems very similar to the Agile cult to me at this point.
mo_42 4y ago
As in any other scientific field: you put forward a theory and if there is enough evidence that does not fit the theory it’s debunked. In economics, "enough" is hard to assess though. Also, a theory may linger around for a while because it suits the agenda of some people. And I guess many more methodical issues like these.

kavalg 4y ago

Consumption is driven by the availability of money in the form of income/stimulus or credit.

pixelfarmer 4y ago

Exactly. It can also easily be seen via stock indices, the likes of S&P 500 and similar. The general curve is "exponentially upwards", which implies that someone somewhere must make money available in the very same fashion. Now, looking at fiat money I think it is clear how that comes to be, but that also means that all this fake money -- technically massive amounts of debt piled on debt, plus interest on all of it -- is aplenty. As you wrote, it was the hickups in the actual economy which caused the price hike, and with all that "money" available it was also clear that this inflation wouldn't go down anytime soon as so called "experts" were talking about initially. In fact, it is a wonderful dumping ground for all this junk in the stock market, although by now it is more of a trickle in relation to the amounts piled up there ...

thworp 4y ago

You can only say that once you accept inflation to mean "a single number representing price increases", which is so over-simplified as to be laughable. Not to mention easily manipulated by statistical tricks and more obvious tricks like weighing for "feature increase" or using country-wide medians and not weighing those for population distribution. If you look at real estate prices vs CPI since MMT really began, real estate grew much faster than CPI, in some cities over twice as fast. That is a direct result of all the excess money that wasn't needed for productive endeavours finding a "safe" place to be parked. Similarly having bonds yield below even the cooked inflation number forces safe traditional investors like pension funds to chase stock market returns which was a large contributor to the gigantic bubble that is now popping. Redefining inflation to mean consumer price increase was a very sneaky move to be sure. A hundred years ago your statement would have been read as "inflation doesn't cause inflation" since it meant any expansion of the money supply.

ClumsyPilot 4y ago
> as "inflation doesn't cause inflation" since it meant any expansion of the money supply. Since 1950's, population has doubled and GDP is up 10x. What should money supply be for it to cause zero inflation? 1x? 2x? 10x?
- thworp 4y ago
  I don't know, but I do strongly believe that the "conventional wisdom" that deflation is a horrible phenomenon that leads to a decades-long depression is bullshit. The entire process of industrialization was hugely deflationary Yet still the 1800s were the first time in history where quality of life for the average Joe improved by leaps and bounds. Diet, medicine, child mortality, wealth all started improving exponentially. Meanwhile under the monetary alchemists and "stabilizing" regime of central banks real wages have stagnated, crises still occur every 10 years and the entire system is so fragile that one major event could collapse the whole house of cards.
  - SgtBastard 4y ago
    >The entire process of industrialization was hugely deflationary Prices definitely lowered, but the difference being that while there was also supplier upheaval as artisan/bespoke producers were replaced by mass production - the industrialists were enormously and sustainably profitable and could in turn employ those displaced from the failed producers. Aggregate demand arguably increased with the move of labour from rural agriculture to urban manufacturing. A deflationary cycle annihilates demand by definition and fixed costs then eat producers alive - leading to wealth destruction, unemployment, debt writeoffs and credit tightening. Which in turn leads to more demand annihilation.

parineum 4y ago

Printing money causing inflation has got to be one of the simplest things in economics to understand. Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. And what's your source on Monetarism being debunked, the people printing currency? It's pretty strange how, when all the money was being printed, it wasn't that hard to find a plethora of economists warning that it would cause inflation (due to Monetarism principles) and then, now that inflation is rampant, that's not seen as evidence to the theory. Furthermore, change the interest rates to curb inflation is exactly in-line with that theory because higher interest rates cause people to take their inflated currency out of circulation and into savings.

matwood 4y ago
> Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. So as the supply chain continues to improve, prices should come down? Inflation is too much money, chasing too few goods. It's the push/pull between money supply and goods in the market that drives inflation. Money can't be talked about in a vacuum.
- argentinian 4y ago
  > So as the supply chain continues to improve, prices should come down? That's very often the case.
em500 4y ago
> Printing money causing inflation has got to be one of the simplest things in economics to understand. Increase supply of thing, thing becomes worth less. One more easy things in economics to understand is that your second sentence is only true if demand is assumed to be constant.

argentinian 4y ago

In Argentina, with our inflation over 100% a year, arguments like yours are very common. e.g. https://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/economia/2-190369-2012-03-25.html https://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/economia/2-190369-2012-03...