4 ms·

>By giving money to people without producing more stuff - or even making it harder to produce the same - you MUST have inflation, rationing, or empty shelves -

>By giving money to people without producing more stuff - or even making it harder to produce the same - you MUST have inflation, rationing, or empty shelves - and often all three. Completely inaccurate. Giving people money that came from taxes does not increase the money supply. Giving people money that came from selling bonds does not increase the money supply. Only printing money increases the money supply.

pessimizer 4y ago
It's the household finance mental model of national accounting that won't go away.
somenameforme 4y ago
The main driver in inflation is monetary velocity - the rate at which money is exchanging hands in the market. Increases in monetary supply almost invariably lead to increases in monetary velocity, so the two are generally equated - but this is not strictly necessary. If I gave you a quadrillion dollars tomorrow, and you chose to simply keep it under your [rather large] bed, but otherwise continued living as you do - then obviously no inflation is going to happen, even though you just increased the monetary supply quite substantially. So while one could nitpick some points about the specifics of government actions in relation to the monetary supply, even if we take all of your points for granted - there would almost certainly be inflation proportional to the amount given. The only way there would be no inflation is if this action didn't increase monetary velocity.
- RhodesianHunter 4y ago
  >The main driver in inflation is monetary velocity I would say this is also mostly innacurate. Velocity is one factor, but may or may not be the driving factor depending on circumstances. If a global pandemic shuts down most of the manufacturing cities in China, and a war in Ukraine takes Russian energy and Ukrainian grain out of the supply equation, then the velocity of money is irrelevant compared to supply constraints.
- cheriot 4y ago
  So tax $1.10 for every $1 redistributed. It's a choice to frame inflation as coming from redistribution vs the wealthy avoiding taxes.
  - somenameforme 4y ago
    Again this is not really a solution to the problem. Because the issue is not one of monetary supply, but of velocity. Giving money to people who will spend that money increases monetary velocity. The only way to prevent this is to reduce the amount of money people are spending. That's why, for instance, the Fed is currently raising interest rates. They want to 'gently' brake the economy (while trying to avoid breaking it) such that people stop spending so much money, and inflation cools down. By contrast countless countries have tried to solve inflation by simply naively tackling the problem. People don't have enough money to buy chicken? Well obviously we just need to give them more money! And that's how you get Zimbabwe. [1] Alternatively, another direct approach is to say "Okay - companies may no longer charge more than $0.50 for a chicken." That's how you get Venezuela. [2] [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/may/14/zimbabwe-trillion-dollar-note-hyerinflation-investment https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/may/14/zimbabwe-trill... [2] - https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/venezuelas-empty-shelves-idUSRTX47AWF https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/venezuelas-empty-shelve...
    - cheriot 4y ago
      That's why I reference a net removal of spending > So tax $1.10 for every $1 redistributed
Nifty3929 4y ago
Printing Money == Borrowing Money in our modern banking systems. And borrowing is often exactly how this gets funded. Also, it's not just about the money supply. It's about who has the money and what they do with it. Taking money from a rich person who might have had it tied up in stock, and giving it to a poor person who takes it to the grocery store - will not put anything more on the shelves in that grocery store. In the aggregate, it MUST do one of those three things. It may ALSO decrease the price of stock as it's sold by the rich people. Clearly the economy is complicated, and it's hard to follow around the money. That's why I like to get back to fundamentals. Not even economics, but basically physics: We can't consume what isn't produced. Money is to some degree beside the point. If we want people (of any class) to have more stuff, then we must allow for that stuff to be produced.
- RhodesianHunter 4y ago
  >Printing Money == Borrowing Money in our modern banking systems. Not exactly. Printing simply introduces new money supply. Borrowing (or selling bonds in our case) comes with a corresponding liability that decreases the supply over time in an aggregate amount greater than the original amount, and results in a corresponding difference in behavior from the borrower.
ars 4y ago
Actually money from selling bonds does increase the money supply. The government hands out that money, and people use it to buy more bonds, then the government hands out more money, and repeat. There is now more money in the world. Yes, if you unwind everything it will go back down, but that's never actually done.
- RhodesianHunter 4y ago
  > Actually money from selling bonds does increase the money supply. With a corresponding liability that will eventually remove more money from the system than was introduced. This is of course a dramatically different equation.

pessimizer 4y ago

It's the household finance mental model of national accounting that won't go away.

somenameforme 4y ago

The main driver in inflation is monetary velocity - the rate at which money is exchanging hands in the market. Increases in monetary supply almost invariably lead to increases in monetary velocity, so the two are generally equated - but this is not strictly necessary. If I gave you a quadrillion dollars tomorrow, and you chose to simply keep it under your [rather large] bed, but otherwise continued living as you do - then obviously no inflation is going to happen, even though you just increased the monetary supply quite substantially. So while one could nitpick some points about the specifics of government actions in relation to the monetary supply, even if we take all of your points for granted - there would almost certainly be inflation proportional to the amount given. The only way there would be no inflation is if this action didn't increase monetary velocity.

RhodesianHunter 4y ago
>The main driver in inflation is monetary velocity I would say this is also mostly innacurate. Velocity is one factor, but may or may not be the driving factor depending on circumstances. If a global pandemic shuts down most of the manufacturing cities in China, and a war in Ukraine takes Russian energy and Ukrainian grain out of the supply equation, then the velocity of money is irrelevant compared to supply constraints.
cheriot 4y ago
So tax $1.10 for every $1 redistributed. It's a choice to frame inflation as coming from redistribution vs the wealthy avoiding taxes.
- somenameforme 4y ago
  Again this is not really a solution to the problem. Because the issue is not one of monetary supply, but of velocity. Giving money to people who will spend that money increases monetary velocity. The only way to prevent this is to reduce the amount of money people are spending. That's why, for instance, the Fed is currently raising interest rates. They want to 'gently' brake the economy (while trying to avoid breaking it) such that people stop spending so much money, and inflation cools down. By contrast countless countries have tried to solve inflation by simply naively tackling the problem. People don't have enough money to buy chicken? Well obviously we just need to give them more money! And that's how you get Zimbabwe. [1] Alternatively, another direct approach is to say "Okay - companies may no longer charge more than $0.50 for a chicken." That's how you get Venezuela. [2] [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/may/14/zimbabwe-trillion-dollar-note-hyerinflation-investment https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/may/14/zimbabwe-trill... [2] - https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/venezuelas-empty-shelves-idUSRTX47AWF https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/venezuelas-empty-shelve...
  - cheriot 4y ago
    That's why I reference a net removal of spending > So tax $1.10 for every $1 redistributed

Nifty3929 4y ago

Printing Money == Borrowing Money in our modern banking systems. And borrowing is often exactly how this gets funded. Also, it's not just about the money supply. It's about who has the money and what they do with it. Taking money from a rich person who might have had it tied up in stock, and giving it to a poor person who takes it to the grocery store - will not put anything more on the shelves in that grocery store. In the aggregate, it MUST do one of those three things. It may ALSO decrease the price of stock as it's sold by the rich people. Clearly the economy is complicated, and it's hard to follow around the money. That's why I like to get back to fundamentals. Not even economics, but basically physics: We can't consume what isn't produced. Money is to some degree beside the point. If we want people (of any class) to have more stuff, then we must allow for that stuff to be produced.

RhodesianHunter 4y ago
>Printing Money == Borrowing Money in our modern banking systems. Not exactly. Printing simply introduces new money supply. Borrowing (or selling bonds in our case) comes with a corresponding liability that decreases the supply over time in an aggregate amount greater than the original amount, and results in a corresponding difference in behavior from the borrower.

ars 4y ago

Actually money from selling bonds does increase the money supply. The government hands out that money, and people use it to buy more bonds, then the government hands out more money, and repeat. There is now more money in the world. Yes, if you unwind everything it will go back down, but that's never actually done.

RhodesianHunter 4y ago
> Actually money from selling bonds does increase the money supply. With a corresponding liability that will eventually remove more money from the system than was introduced. This is of course a dramatically different equation.