Thursday 31 March 2022

"100% of excessive inflation is due to bad monetary policy. "


"100% of excessive inflation is due to bad monetary policy. This shouldn’t even be debatable. I don’t know of any respectable theory (monetarist, Keynesian, Austrian, etc.) where this is not true.
     "And yet according to a recent 'Vox' article, economists have no idea what is causing the current bout of excessive inflation....
    "When inflation is higher than it should be for demand side reasons, it is always 100% due to bad monetary policy.
    "And now Vox tells us that economists are now talking about 'corporate greed'? Seriously?
    "And just who are these so-called 'economists'? According to 'Vox' they are 'progressives'...
    "Wait.... I thought the left believed we should 'trust the science'? Since when did progressive economists become the left wing version of QAnon?"

 

1 comment:

MarkT said...

Perhaps the confusion about 'why inflation now?' is because all the credit creation starting with the GFC about 10 years ago led to little price inflation except on assets, until the last year or so.

Is there any writings you're aware of, or any theory that explains why there was little price inflation on most goods for the first 9 years or so after massive money printing started, but only really took off in the last year or so?

If I had to hypothesise, it would be something like:

1. For the first 9 years or so after the GFC, increased efficiency (brought about by advancing technology and other productivity gains) more or less kept up with inflationary effects. Without those inflationary effects we would have seen reduced prices.

2. With the onset of covid and the disruption that's caused to efficiency, the monetary inflation had finally overwhelmed the efficiency effects.