Inflation 101

Sorry to deviate from Man Week, but the guy who gave you the Ben Bernank is at it again... and it’s gold.

What about inflation statistics other than food and gas? Are those going up?

Somewhat, but they’re understating the truth.

Why?

They use virtual price decreases to offset real price increases.

What is a virtual price decrease?

According to economists, if a fancy Smartphone costs the same as it did last year but has more features, then its deflating.”

Haha. Classic.

Enjoy your weekend monkeys.

15 Comments
 

"But what about people that cant afford a fancy phone? Those people are just screwed." lol

Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art - Andy Warhol
 
DurbanDiMangusWhile likely taken out of context I cannot believe headofNYfed just utilized ipad 2 as evidence for inflation/deflation discussion. Some of the logic @ the end re: savings, and deposit rates is kind of convoluted tho

the iPad 2 comment is at about the 13 minute mark. Supposedly someone in the crowd quipped "I can't eat an iPad" which would be awesome.

At the 10 minute mark he starts talking about this "new tool" the Fed has to prevent banks from lending their excess reserves, they're going to pay interest on it. But won't that just increase ER more? I'm not quite sure I see how that's supposed to help.

 

Even the ETrade baby is losing money ( Pre-'08 video)

" A recession is when other people lose their job, a depression is when you lose your job. "
 

The adjustments for quality are the most retarded thing ever and just goes to show that economics has officially lost all common sense.

The computer I used today is probably like what, 4x more powerful than the one I used 4 years ago. But does that mean that my productive output is 4x greater? Can I write emails 4x faster? Can I write documents 4x faster? Are my models in excel done 4x faster?

What lunacy...recently a report came out that said that by the old method, inflation is at about 10% right now. The Fed can't justify monetizing the debt if the government says inflation is 10%, so the numbers are cooked to allow the money printing policy to go through.

 
alexpaschThe adjustments for quality are the most retarded thing ever and just goes to show that economics has officially lost all common sense.

The computer I used today is probably like what, 4x more powerful than the one I used 4 years ago. But does that mean that my productive output is 4x greater? Can I write emails 4x faster? Can I write documents 4x faster? Are my models in excel done 4x faster?

What lunacy...recently a report came out that said that by the old method, inflation is at about 10% right now. The Fed can't justify monetizing the debt if the government says inflation is 10%, so the numbers are cooked to allow the money printing policy to go through.

I think the idea is that you can buy the old products for less. You can buy a 4 year old computer today for way less than 4 years ago, so technology prices are deflating even if current computers cost the same as they did four years ago.

 
Best Response

Btw, though everyone cites computers, the adjustment is done to EVERYTHING (houses and cars are a huge portion of the CPI).

There's also the substitution effect, which means that say the price of beef goes up, they just assume consumers buy more rice, which is cheap. While this is true to an extent, it's not really the right thing to do in my opinion because you can have the same GDP and a lower quality of life.

This is nothing new, here's a great article on the subject from the year 2000. http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2000/ref_quality_adj_2742.html

Betting on high inflation is necessary if the government is going to lie about inflation and use those lies to justify negative real rates on their debt (and thus misprice the entire dollar-denominated bond market).

 

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Thanks, Amitava

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