4 ms·

Exactly. People are only trying to keep up with inflation created by easing monetary policy and supply-demand imbalances during COVID and post-COVID.

bryanlarsen 3y ago
People keep repeating this like this is a self-obvious truth. Both of these factors are long gone. IMO, there are two major components to inflation. 1. The war in Ukraine spiked energy and food prices. People don't fully grasp how fundamental energy costs are to prices. Energy costs are X1% of the cost of a good, X2% of the cost of the parts in that good, X3% of the cost of the materials in those parts, X4% of the factory and tooling, X5% for transport of all those goods, parts, materials, tooling, et cetera. It takes a while to ripple through. The energy cost spike in 1973 caused the inflation crisis of the late 70s and early 80s IMO. 2. Housing, which is a systemic issue that far predates COVID.
- lapcat 3y ago
  You forgot corporate profiteering. Even the Wall Street Journal now admits it: https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-is-inflation-so-sticky-it-could-be-corporate-profits-b78d90b7 https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-is-inflation-so-sticky-it-c...
- walleeee 3y ago
  Energy/material costs and money-printing are not unrelated, in that the latter is being used to paper over extremely worrying trends in the former. 2008-induced QE and covid-induced direct payments are both can-kicking strategies which do not address underlying problems, just temporarily plug leaks in the facade.
  - bryanlarsen 3y ago
    And temporarily plugging leaks was exactly the right thing to do during a temporary world-wide crisis like COVID.
    - walleeee 3y ago
      I make no claim either way on that, just responding to your other point on inflationary forcings.
- argentinian 3y ago
  Congratulations, you sound like a standard Argentinian politician now. Trying to minimize the impact of increasing the money supply.
- sanderjd 3y ago
  If we are talking about the US, I really don't think (1) was a big contributor. Perhaps ironically, the energy price shock in the early days of the war in Ukraine was the thing that actually was "transitory". (I think this is likely less true in Europe, but I haven't paid as much attention to that.)
  - bryanlarsen 3y ago
    Oil prices are global.
    - Ekaros 3y ago
      Oil prices are not particularly high and have taken actual effort by producers to cut down production. Ofc, they are higher than during pandemic, but still not really that high.
    - sanderjd 3y ago
      And yet, this does not contradict what I said. Oil prices, and thus gas prices, did go up quite a bit in the US, but that was clearly "transitory". Certainly this had a large impact on the perception of inflation, since gas prices are very visible. But high gas prices didn't last very long, went up well after inflation had taken root, and went back down well before inflation had begun to ease. I think it's possible that other energy prices (like natural gas, which is not a global market) may have driven inflation outside the US in a more meaningful way, but like I said, I'm not sure that's true either because I just haven't followed that so much.

bryanlarsen 3y ago

People keep repeating this like this is a self-obvious truth. Both of these factors are long gone. IMO, there are two major components to inflation. 1. The war in Ukraine spiked energy and food prices. People don't fully grasp how fundamental energy costs are to prices. Energy costs are X1% of the cost of a good, X2% of the cost of the parts in that good, X3% of the cost of the materials in those parts, X4% of the factory and tooling, X5% for transport of all those goods, parts, materials, tooling, et cetera. It takes a while to ripple through. The energy cost spike in 1973 caused the inflation crisis of the late 70s and early 80s IMO. 2. Housing, which is a systemic issue that far predates COVID.

lapcat 3y ago
You forgot corporate profiteering. Even the Wall Street Journal now admits it: https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-is-inflation-so-sticky-it-could-be-corporate-profits-b78d90b7 https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-is-inflation-so-sticky-it-c...
walleeee 3y ago
Energy/material costs and money-printing are not unrelated, in that the latter is being used to paper over extremely worrying trends in the former. 2008-induced QE and covid-induced direct payments are both can-kicking strategies which do not address underlying problems, just temporarily plug leaks in the facade.
- bryanlarsen 3y ago
  And temporarily plugging leaks was exactly the right thing to do during a temporary world-wide crisis like COVID.
  - walleeee 3y ago
    I make no claim either way on that, just responding to your other point on inflationary forcings.
argentinian 3y ago
Congratulations, you sound like a standard Argentinian politician now. Trying to minimize the impact of increasing the money supply.
sanderjd 3y ago
If we are talking about the US, I really don't think (1) was a big contributor. Perhaps ironically, the energy price shock in the early days of the war in Ukraine was the thing that actually was "transitory". (I think this is likely less true in Europe, but I haven't paid as much attention to that.)
- bryanlarsen 3y ago
  Oil prices are global.
  - Ekaros 3y ago
    Oil prices are not particularly high and have taken actual effort by producers to cut down production. Ofc, they are higher than during pandemic, but still not really that high.
  - sanderjd 3y ago
    And yet, this does not contradict what I said. Oil prices, and thus gas prices, did go up quite a bit in the US, but that was clearly "transitory". Certainly this had a large impact on the perception of inflation, since gas prices are very visible. But high gas prices didn't last very long, went up well after inflation had taken root, and went back down well before inflation had begun to ease. I think it's possible that other energy prices (like natural gas, which is not a global market) may have driven inflation outside the US in a more meaningful way, but like I said, I'm not sure that's true either because I just haven't followed that so much.