That’s not how inflation works. And deflation often goes hand-in-hand with some bad economic effects.
ETA: To provide a useful analogy: people think of inflation as how high prices are, whereas inflation is actually the rate at which prices are increasing (or not). It’s like the difference between speed and acceleration - you can have zero acceleration and still be going very fast.
Thank you @Gyrate
Prices are hurting a lot of people. It’s hard to get much of anything in a grocery cart for under $150. That’s barely a weeks groceries for me.
It’ll be a election issue for both parties.
If prices go down, that’s a one-way ticket to free-fall economic disaster. Prices (other than some groceries and petroleum that are mostly cyclical) always rise and stay risen. What matters is the rate at which they’re rising. A smidgen per year is good and greases the wheels of commerce & labor. A bunch all at once is bad.
We just had a bunch all at once. But that bunch has ended and the rate has dropped back to smidgen per year. Which is the healthy place for it to be.
Economic ignorance is a powerful and dangerous political force.
If a gallon of milk is $2 when you make $10 an hour, if it goes up to $4 when you’re making $20 an hour then there is no real impact on you. It still costs 20% of your hourly income.
It’s only a problem when it rapidly increases to $4 and you’re still making $10 an hour.
Prices aren’t going to go down for the most part. Some things might as the supply chains are solidified again and retailers try to undercut each other for your business, but generally that’s just how things cost now. Income will adjust across the board and people will be able to afford them as much as they could before.
It’s only when costs go up quickly that there’s a problem, and since the pandemic disrupted things across the world that is what was happening.
I think back to the 90s when I first went into the job market and had to be self-sufficient. The cost of everything was so much less back then but so was my income. Minimum wage in my state was under $5 an hour. Today it’s over $16. That’s more than triple. That’s why it’s not a big deal that things are so expensive. If you just look at the prices of things, you aren’t going to know how healthy the economy really is and how bad people have it.
Oh, how I wish there were some way to get people to understand that the president has very little influence on the economy.
Compared to what?
Inflation is down and just about over, despite what one piece of anecdotal info may see to say.
The GOP is lying- the economy is doing great.
The GOP will lie.
True.
But but prices are going up faster than wages! Not.
So why does the big lie have such legs?
My WAG is that many got used to having the extra cash and spending power of the Covid stimulus payouts. They still perceive that they can spend less freely now than a few years ago. And, as the article details, it has been the other around for a bit before this.
Everyone has seen their prices go up. Not everyone has seen their wages go up.
Point well made, and even without looking up anything I can guess that the bulk of the wage (and wealth) growth is concentrated in the richest, who are also least impacted by price inflation, while those impacted by price inflation the most likely have had the least wage growth.
Of course a first term president in particular has little impact on economic fortunes, but it’s the economy stupid resonates and there may be some reality to the dissatisfaction?
Goebbels and the Big Lie. The GOP has grabbed on to this, and also using it for “crime is out of control!!!”.
It is not likely he will. That is just how Democrats operate.
Biden himself was the compromise we needed in 2020 and the voters seem to have been inexperienced if they thought he would run for one term. That rarely happens. Most of us knew he would be the candidate at this point. Unless something happens to either it will be Biden Harris.
If Harris doesn’t want to run again for VP maybe Biden can get Hunter to run. He could be the Drug Czar.
Mock someone’s addiction struggles, very classy.
Many addiction counselers are in recovery themselves. I’m sure Hunter Biden would be a fine drug czar (if we still have such a position). Hunter is well educated, passionate, and very smart. He’d probably be a fine VP, but not a good idea given he’s from the same state as his dad.
And we learned in the last administration, having children who can’t get a security clearance doesn’t mean they can’t have high positions in the White House if they’re the offspring of the President.
So let’s say we want inflation at 3% for economic growth. One year we have 8% inflation. What happens to that extra 5%? We almost never get it back; would we see a year where prices go down 2%? That’s what’s so insidious about inflation is that when it does go back to normal it doesn’t undo the effects of years with high inflation.
I am not sure you understand inflation. Prices go up, but so do wages.
Yes, 100 years ago, a steak dinner was under a dollar, but that doesnt matter as a teacher earned $1500 a year. You dont “get back” the increase in prices, since you dont get a cut back in wages either.
The issue with high inflation is that while it is going on, wages, etc don’t keep up as fast. So, high inflation is bad during that year, but it evens out when wages catch up.
OK, make him the Secretary of the Navy. Or the Energy Czar. Or Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. Commissioner of the IRS…
Moderating:
These comments have no place in this discussion, serve only as a distraction and are a hijack. Drop this line of commentary now.
Not at the same pace as inflation. Possibly if you have a COLA but most people don’t and even if you do, it is almost always less than inflation.
They do, it just takes longer. Which is why high inflation is bad- today.
But the fact that we had stagflation during the carter administration means little.