Tag Archives: inflation

Can we be honest and say that many of the reductions in value, quantity and quality are actually instances of fraud? Yesterday, I showed how Consumer Prices Have Soared 160% Since 2001 for everything from burritos to healthcare. This enormous loss of purchasing power is not reflected in the official measure of inflation, which claims inflation is subdued (1% or so annually). But price inflation doesn’t necessarily...

Finanz und Wirtschaft, November 23, 2016. PDF. The diagnosis is far from clear. Nor is the therapy.

Between November 8 and 9, medium and long-term US Treasury Yield Curve rates increased substantially: Date1 Mo3 Mo6 Mo1 Yr2 Yr3 Yr5 Yr7 Yr10 Yr20 Yr30 Yr 11/01/160.240.350.500.650.830.991.301.611.832.242.58 11/02/160.240.370.510.640.810.981.261.571.812.222.56 11/03/160.240.380.520.640.810.981.261.581.822.252.60 11/04/160.250.380.520.620.800.951.241.551.792.222.56 11/07/160.280.410.540.630.820.991.291.601.832.262.60 11/08/160.280.430.560.710.871.041.341.651.882.292.63...

Summary: Price pressures appear to have bottomed for the US, UK, and to a lesser extent, EMU. Rise in prices cannot be reduced solely to the increase of oil. Core prices are also rising. Back in the early post-crisis days, many pundits consumed lots of ink and column inches warning the strong inflationary pressures would be fueled by the orthodox and unorthodox monetary policy. Not only did this not...

Summary: China’s PPI rose for the first time in four years. It is related to the rise in commodities. Yet there are good reasons there is not a perfect fit between China’s PPI and commodity prices. US and UK CPI to be reported next week, risk is on the upside. China reported its first increase in producer prices in four years earlier today.  As one might suspect, producer prices are often driven by commodity...

What politicians say and what presidents do often have little to do with one another. U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, for example, implemented the New Deal a year after the Democratic Party pledged to slash government spending. Still, with the U.S. presidential election fast approaching, the economists on Credit Suisse’s Global Markets team analyzed the campaign promises made to date in the hope of giving investors some sense of what the future might hold.   They determined that if...

At the recent Karl Brunner Centenary event, Ernst Baltensperger characterized Monetarism as a set of five convictions: Money matters (as accepted in the neoclassical synthesis) Rules are preferred over discretion (in contrast to the views of Modigliani, Samuelson or Klein), but some flexibility is accepted Inflation and inflation expectations are key (in contrast to traditional Keynesian views)—adaptive expectation formation, parallels to Phelps Money growth targeting is useful—Brunner...

In the JEEA 14(4) (August 2016) Klaus Adam and Junyi Zhu argue that unexpected price-level movements generate sizable wealth redistribution in the Euro Area (EA) … The EA as a whole is a net loser of unexpected price-level decreases, with Italy, Greece, Portugal, and Spain losing most in per capita terms, and Belgium and Malta being net winners. Governments are net losers of deflation, while the household (HH) sector is a net winner … HHs in Belgium, Ireland, Malta, and Germany experience...

The Economist speculates that central bank independence might be on its way out. The article suggests that motives for independence (i.e., Sargent/Wallace or Barro/Gordon type arguments) might be less relevant given the environment of low inflation and interest rates. See also my earlier, related blog post.

Summary: Service prices are rising, while goods prices have steadily fallen. Non-durable goods prices are stabilizing, while durable goods prices are still falling. The decline in durable goods prices is an important economic development. The rust line is service prices.  They are steadily increasing.  No deflation or disinflation here.  Think about rent, medical services, education, and entertainment. The three...