There’s a lot of talk about inflation and its causes. Is it corporate greed? Supply chain issues? One clear base cause of inflation less talked about is having an inflationary currency supply. Any other inflation caused by supply chain issues, corporate greed, lack of market competition, etc is just added on top of that. Fiat inflationary currency is a rather new invention in terms of the human timeline. In the US, Nixon is the start of it. Central banks aim for 2-3% inflation in “good years”. The money supply expands, the portion of that supply a single dollar represents, and therefore its value, decreases. This isn’t a conspiracy, it’s government policy, and both parties gleefully support it because it benefits their rich donors.
Think of it: in the last 50 years, everything has gotten cheaper to produce thanks to increasing mechanization, outsourcing to cheap labor/low regulation countries, and extremely efficient supply chains. Yet so many things “cost more” than they did 50 years ago. Even basics like bread. What used to be 5c in the US in the 50s now costs $5.00. How is that the case? Shouldn’t it cost less? Where is that “extra efficiency” going if not to lower prices? The answer: bread is the same value it’s always been, the money has gotten less valuable. This is how they keep working class people running on a treadmill, never able to achieve economic mobility.
Inflationary currency devalues the currency you worked hard to earn by increasing the supply. It hits the middle class the worst because they have more of their net wealth in cash, often in the form of emergency funds, savings, and putting together enough money for a down payment on a home. Rich people have their money in assets which aren’t harmed by currency inflation. Actually, even worse, it inflates the value of those assets! If the dollar loses value (all other things being equal), it takes more dollar to buy a share in Amazon, just like it takes more dollars to buy a loaf of bread. Poor people live hand to mouth, so their net wealth is not impacted much, but inflationary currency prevents them from saving and “moving up”. If you want to identify the causes of increasing wealth disparity, the inability of people to save money and theft of value from the middle class via money supply expansion is a major one.
It would be so badass if someone could invent a currency that everyone has equal control over the creation of. One where no powerful people could have a monopoly over it and use it to squeeze the value out of anyone who holds it. One that could be easily divisible and transfered electronically to anyone the owner chooses without paying ridiculous fees and getting permission. If someone made something like that, then all these people who hate the current system could flock to it because it is exactly what they claim they want…
…or maybe they would just mindlessly attack it by calling it a scam and a ponzi scheme and ridicule anyone who points out that it checks off all the boxes they claim to want checked.
Yeah, it’d be a shame if someone invented that but then made it either so it only functions by burning obscene amounts of energy or made it directly regressive by just handing out more currency to people who already had the most. But even then they’d have to avoid insane volitility removing its usefullness as a store of value and prevent the lack of regulation of it allowing all the scams that financial regulation has spent 300 years preventing.
Good point. It’s so nice that the currently popular monetary systems don’t use obscene amounts of energy to create, transport, and enforce them, as well as all the fuel and energy it takes to transport everyone involved in it. Its also great that regulation is so perfect that no criminals are printing their own cash as much as they want. It’s also so nice that the regulations of the current system prevent the rich and powerful from abusing the system to further their lead, it’s amazing how nobody ever can find any reason to complain about that. It’s definitely not going to the people who already have the most of it. The current system is just so beautifully equal.