The Cure Is Worse Than The Disease

According to the New York Times inflation is thought by the Federal Reserve Bank to be not rising fast enough with many people thinking that a dose or two of it would help cure the economic patient of the headaches, IBS and voices off that afflict it at present.

Personally, we seem to be experiencing increasing inflation no matter what the official figures allege. The bills and the payments out are going up a lot faster that the money coming in, but the official figures are arranged to deal with that.

Much of the inflation is hidden or disguised one way or another.  Check just what is in the pack at the supermarket and how much it might weigh compared with the past.  A little less here and a little more cost there on many things will add up.

In the 1960's we had a lot of expert economists jogging around claiming that "moderate" and/or "managed" inflation would get the economy going in the right direction and all would take care of itself.  Our all wise and omnipotent money masters would see to that.

What they did not understand that the money was moving faster than they thought.  Also, they could only manage what they knew and on past data.  It turned out that they did not know half enough and what happened next did not relate much to the past data.

Inflation might stimulate some things but not most.  The real trouble will be the political fall out when it hits too many people and damages too much of the economy.

One thing will be sudden and sharp rises in rates of interest.  As the West seems to be bent on stimulating personal debt as part of the package along with other forms of debt the result may be to impoverish us all on a permanent basis.