Category: Inflation
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Saturday, March 14, 2015
An Austrian take on Inflation / Economics / Inflation
By: Alasdair_Macleod
We know that today’s macroeconomists are very confused about inflation, if only because despite all experience they think they can print money and increase bank credit with a view to generating price inflation at a controlled 2% rate. Admittedly, most of them will acknowledge there is more hope than reality about the controlled bit. Economic policy should be based on more than just hope.
Tuesday, March 03, 2015
BLS CPI Lie - How's That Dsflation Working Out for You? / Economics / Inflation
By: James_Quinn
The BLS put out their monthly CPI lie last week. They issued the proclamation that inflation is dead. Did you know your costs are 0.1% lower than they were one year ago. They then used these deflation numbers to proclaim your real wages soared last month. It’s all good. The American consumer is so flush with cash, they decided to spend less money for the second month in a row. The Wall Street shysters are so happy with declining consumer spending, declining corporate profits, and a global recession, they pushed the NASDAQ up to 5,000 for the first time in 15 years. Hey!!! That was the year 2000. Things really got better after that milestone.
Monday, March 02, 2015
The CPI Lag in Disguise / Economics / Inflation
By: Dr_Jeff_Lewis
Here’s another reader’s original and inspired perspective on the short term effects of consumer price inflation and how it differs from the inflation in speculative finance. This latter type of inflation will ultimately break the system and the currency.
Reader Dan pointed out:
“Regardless of the fluctuations in paper currency values, (which are basically measured against the value of gold), precious metals tend to retain their value in the long run as determined by their calculated exchange rates for goods and services.
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Thursday, February 26, 2015
The Fed Waited Too Long: Here Comes Inflation / Economics / Inflation
By: EconMatters
Sunday, February 22, 2015
Inflation is Dead, Long Live Inflation / Economics / Inflation
By: Submissions
Nicholas Migiliaccio writes: This is a composite index composed of securities whose movements tend to anticipate the subsequent commencing and movement of Inflation and Deflation.
In this illustration, the manifestation of Deflation, is subtracted from the manifestation of Inflation, and the remainder is displayed graphically.
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Wednesday, February 18, 2015
UK Good Deflation Election Boost for Conservatives But Inflation Mega-trend Remains Exponential / Economics / Inflation
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The latest UK official CPI inflation data is at an historic low rate of just 0.3% which prompted the mainstream financial press and academic economists to go overboard on commentary on the dangers of deflation, much as the Bank of England tends to propagandise in its quarterly inflation reports of why Inflation needs to be at or above 2% CPI. The press continues to warn of outright deflation later this year as CPI is expected to nudge below 0% and how this is bad for the economy as people put of consuming today in the anticipation of lower prices tomorrow.
Monday, February 09, 2015
Yellen Looking For Inflation In All The Wrong Places / Economics / Inflation
By: Michael_Pento
In 1958, economist W.H. Phillips wrote a paper that argued an inverse relationship existed between wage inflation and unemployment. The crux of his theory was when unemployment is high wage growth is absent; but when the unemployment rate is low wages rise rapidly. Philips established his theory under the framework of a curve and it was aptly referred to as “The Phillips Curve”. However, many economists wrongly adopted the Phillips Curve by relating it to general price inflation, rather than to just wage inflation. Sadly for Phillips Curve enthusiasts, the high inflation and high employment rates of the 1970’s turned this metric on its head.
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
UK CPI Inflation Smoke and Mirrors Deflation Warning, Inflation Mega-trend is Exponential / Economics / Inflation
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The official CPI measure for UK Inflation fell to just 0.5% in December with the more recognised RPI falling by 0.4% to 1.6% prompting the mainstream press to turn it's Eye of Sauron onto Inflation as the topic of the day, usually leading with commonsense reporting of the positives of low inflation such as falling energy and fuel costs and more disposable earnings for Britains wages slaves after having struggled for over 6 years with stagnating and even falling real terms wages. Though the media reports soon conclude with a lengthy explanation by an academic economist of why deflation is very, very, very bad in that it could trigger a downward economic death spiral as consumers put off buying goods and services in anticipation of lower future prices and hence the economy enters into an deflationary spiral of falling demand and output as occurred during the 1930's and for a few months into Mid 2009.
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Jaguar Inflation - A Layman's Explanation of Government Intervention / Economics / Inflation
By: EWI
I am tired of hearing people insist that the Fed can expand credit all it wants. Sometimes an analogy clarifies a subject, so let's try one.
It may sound crazy, but suppose the government were to decide that the health of the nation depends upon producing Jaguar automobiles and providing them to as many people as possible. To facilitate that goal, it begins operating Jaguar plants all over the country, subsidizing production with tax money. To everyone's delight, it offers these luxury cars for sale at 50 percent off the old price. People flock to the showrooms and buy. Later, sales slow down, so the government cuts the price in half again. More people rush in and buy.
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Wednesday, December 17, 2014
How Inflation Changes Retirement Benefit Choices / Personal_Finance / Inflation
By: Dan_Amerman
One of the most important financial questions someone of retirement age in the United States faces is when to start collecting their Social Security payments ─ and this crucial decision deserves the best possible information to work from.
Recently, there has been quite a bit of publicity about studies showing that for a retiree who lives to an average age, there is a six figure advantage to waiting until age 70 to begin the collection of Social Security payments. That is an amazing advantage ─ but does it hold up under close scrutiny?
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Friday, November 14, 2014
Inflation Chronicles - Art Prices So High, “The Crowd Forgot To Clap” / Economics / Inflation
By: John_Rubino
Depending on which expert is talking, the world is either falling into a deflationary abyss or launching an inflationary moonshot. What’s truly weird and fascinating is that they’re both right. The mountain of debt taken on in the past few decades exerts a profoundly deflationary pull on the economies of Europe and Japan, and to a lesser extent the US. At the same time the torrent of currency flowing out of the world’s central banks is swelling the accounts of the super-rich who are converting it into real assets as fast as they can, causing near-hyperinflation in some favored markets. Hence the spectacle of Paul Krugman (and most Fed governors) complaining about low inflation and warning of a deflationary death spiral, while things like this are happening:
Sunday, October 19, 2014
Reasons the Bernanke-Yellen Asset-Price Inflation May Be Nearing Its End / Economics / Inflation
By: Joseph_T_Salerno
There are strong indications that the remarkable run up of asset prices in the last few years is beginning to run out of steam and may be on the verge of collapse. We will leave aside the question of whether the asset inflation is symptomatic of a garden-variety inflationary boom or is a more virulent bubble phenomenon in which prices are rising today simply because buyers anticipate that they will rise tomorrow.
Thursday, October 16, 2014
The Inflation Imputation, Dear Saver, May You RIP / Economics / Inflation
By: John_Mauldin
A note has been circulating among economists, calling into question the wisdom of another group of economists who wrote an open letter to the Federal Reserve a few years ago suggesting that one of the risks of their quantitative easing program was increased inflation. Since we have not seen CPI inflation, this latter group is calling upon the former to admit they were wrong, that quantitative easing does not in fact cause inflation. To no one’s surprise, Paul Krugman has written rather nastily and arrogantly about the lack of CPI inflation.
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Governments Need Inflation, Economies Don't / Economics / Inflation
By: Peter_Schiff
In an article in the UK's Telegraph on October 10, veteran economic correspondent Ambrose Evans-Pritchard laid bare the essential truth of the nearly universal current embrace of inflation as an economic panacea. While politicians, CEOs and economists talk about demand stimulus and the avoidance of a deflationary trap, Evans-Pritchard reminds us that inflation is all, and always, about debt management.
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
UK Savings and September 1.2% CPI Inflation / Personal_Finance / Inflation
By: MoneyFacts
Inflation figures released today show that the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) fell from 1.5% to 1.2% during September.
To beat inflation, a basic rate taxpayer at 20% needs to find a savings account paying 1.5% per annum, while a higher rate taxpayer at 40% needs to find an account paying at least 1.9%.
Of the 621 non-ISA accounts in the market today, there are 170 that basic rate taxpayers can choose to negate the effects of tax and inflation.
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Thursday, October 09, 2014
It’s Inflation All the Way, Baby! / Economics / Inflation
By: Gary_Tanashian
The title’s quote is one of many eminently quotable messages I had the pleasure of receiving over a few years of contact with a late, great and a very interesting man* named Jonathan Auerbach, who headed a unique specialty (emerging and frontier markets) brokerage in NYC called Auerbach Grayson.
Jon was an honest and ethical man. He was also a gold bug (in that descriptor’s highest form) who innately understood the Kabuki Dance that has been ongoing by monetary authorities since the ‘Age of Inflation onDemand‘ (what guest poster Bruno de Landevoisin calls the Monetized New Millenium) started its most intense and bald faced phase in 2000.
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Tuesday, October 07, 2014
Inflation is Not the Only Way Easy Money Destroys Wealth / Economics / Inflation
By: Frank_Shostak
The US Federal Reserve can keep stimulating the US economy because inflation is posing little threat, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Kocherlakota said. “I am expecting an inflation rate to run below two percent for the next four years, through 2018,” he said. “That means there is more room for monetary policy to be helpful in terms of … boosting demand without running up against generating too much inflation.”
The yearly rate of growth of the official consumer price index (CPI) stood at 1.7 percent in August against two percent in July. According to our estimate, the yearly rate of growth of the CPI could close at 1.4 percent by December. By December next year we forecast the yearly rate of growth of 0.6 percent.
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Wednesday, September 24, 2014
10 Things That Affect Your Purchasing Power / Economics / Inflation
By: Harry_Dent
Rodney Johnson writes: This might be considered “wonkish,” but it tells the story of how middle-class purchasing power has suffered since 2007.
Recently, the Federal Reserve released the 2013 Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF). This tri-annual survey is a treasure trove of information that provides a snapshot into the financial life of the median American in inflation-adjusted 2013 dollars. Notice that I said “median” and not “average”… that’s important.
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Thursday, September 11, 2014
Full Frontal Inflation / Economics / Inflation
By: John_Rubino
By now it’s an article of faith within the sound money community that most major countries have borrowed so much that they’re left with only two options: default on their debt through mass-bankruptcy and a new Great Depression, or inflate it away through stepped-up currency creation.
This is an investment thesis, since a given country’s choice will determine which asset classes rise and fall.
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Thursday, September 11, 2014
Doubling Down on Inflation / Economics / Inflation
By: Peter_Schiff
Friday's release of disappointing August payroll numbers should have been a jarring wake-up call warning Wall Street that the economy has been treading on thin ice. Instead the alarm clock was stuffed under the pillow and Wall Street kept sleeping. The miss was so epic in fact (the 142,000 jobs created was almost 40% below the consensus estimate) that the top analysts on Wall Street did their best to tell us that it was all just a bad dream. Mark Zandi of Moody's reacted on Squawk Box by saying "I don't believe this data." The reliably optimistic Diane Swonk of Mesirow Financial told Reuters the report "sure looks like a fluke, not a trend".