So Where’s The Inflation?

Well yes, the GOP really did turn up the fear flames back "a few months ago" aka: last Fall 2008 about inflation and so on.

But the inflation is real. At the market just the other day I was remarking to a friend how products I paid for last year had doubled in price in one year.

I'd call that inflation. And thanks to the GOP insisting last year that we bail out their tycoon buddies on Wall Street, we'll see more of that instead of less in the coming years.

Official inflation figures never did compare too well with the old supermarket inflation index.
Where is the water that should be going to the job creation/saving garden going?
Check for crimps in the hose, please, gov.

Where is the inflation?

1. Right now, a sensible alternative and probably more conventional at this point, even, is to fear deflation.

2. The federal government has not yet felt the "need" to inflate to monetize the debt (we can reasonably anticipate it might take approaching a "debt trap" first) or to deliberately seek inflation, either to get out of deflation, or later, to do mass currency-production as the vote-buying true opiate of the masses. And the lesser threat (related somewhat to a future debt trap), the threat of a currency devaluation (if China might cease to be the US's prop and ObamaCo's prop, particularly, in buying our debt and helping to retard a slide in our currency's value) is not great or imminent (at least, not yet).

You have to remember that it was a Democrat controlled congress that passed the original TARP and any subsequent bailouts. So, it was the Dems bailing out their Republican enemies' buddies on Wall Street. Man, those Dems must be stupid to get taken in like that, again, just like they were on Iraq. Third time is a charm though....

Don't forget energy. Energy stockpiles are at such record highs that we're about to run out of room for storage (we already have for oil) and yet they are still rather high, especially oil.

You've got a nice reality shield there. I just posted the results of that vote: the Democrats and Bush were for it, the Republicans were more against the bailouts, at least at first. In reality, those that faced close races in their next election were more likely to vote against the bailouts. All politicians bet on people having a short memory.

I'm not saying this as some lover of Republicans, but as one who respects the truth. I will continue to post this reality check as often as you're willing to post your distortion.

Depends on how you look at it. From my point of view it was the Dems keeping empire america alive, which if you told the dove left that they would burst into flames but shhh. If the bailouts would not have happened we would not only be trying to find ways to get our troops home but also trying to find the money to pay the "rent" on all of our global military bases.

From that viewpoint it was a pretty interesting thing to watch. The classic dove party putting it all on the line to ensure we stayed the worlds policeman and the classic party of "spreading democracy" screaming and fighting against it(not enough to stop it just enough to not lose their seats). Doves never seemed to catch that if we failed to do the bail out we would no longer be the sole global super power and things would have to change in a direction they may have liked and the other side never seemed to understand that without the bailouts they would be losing all of those nifty toys we bought on our children's paycheck(we bought many things on it but on average that side tends to spend it on weaponry and tax cuts for the wealthy that our children will pay for).

I know in San Francisco the costs of pretty much everything has increased. And last week my Mom in Alabama was lamenting how expensive things were becoming. She said her usual 20 lb bag of cat food increased in price AND was lowered to a 16 lb bag. She gets less for more.

Inflation is complicated at this time. Inflation has technically been going up in a big way since the 90's from what I have read but we shipped manufacturing overseas which hid inflation as prices stayed pretty constant since it was being made in a cheaper way. Then as inflation grew even more some of those countries lost their manufacturing jobs as we switched them to China and other even cheaper countries. The problem now is that we no longer have any "cheaper" places to shift it to so we are feeling actual inflation on certain items, food/fuel/and other consumables. At the same time though the digital revolution much like the industrial revolution before it is causing massive deflation on many items which is not only normal is beneficial.

Here is where we are now though. The dollar is falling while real estate continues having troubles which was our "stable safe" market where prices always rose. Blue collar jobs that pay a wage you can raise a family on are becoming more myth than reality. We traded our manufacturing economy for a consumer economy just in time to run out of people that love to consume in huge doses. Prices are going up for consumables which we generally import and deflation is hitting the spheres of our emerging industries. Any of these issues alone would be worrisome but controllable, together it will be a long and painful ride and to be honest where as our future still looks very bright not all will be happy with where we end up. Many people were very unhappy with the switch from an agrarian to an industrial economy as well, conservatives I am looking at you on this one since many of the programs you dislike are programs that were created specifically to build us into the industrial goliath we became.

On a side note I still think whether the digital era is a conservative or a liberal era is very up in the air and either side could grab the mantel and run with it but so far the Dems are miles ahead and the Repubs do not seem interested in NEW ideas but only trying to go in reverse.

I will say it again, America does not have a reverse ladies and gents. If you want to be part of the game try to find ways of moving us forward. So far the Dems, whether you agree with their ideas or not, are trying to do that or at least look like it. I would suggest that Repubs do the same but I am sure I will be ignored.

You are absolutely correct and describe what I call the "nightmare" scenario, where inflation runs rampant in pegged markets and commodities due to massive liquidity, deflation continues in domestic products and the dollar keeps falling, raising import cost and interest rates...a deflationary feedback. There is really no clear way out of that.

I was really hoping I was wrong, after all I can barely do my own taxes, but sadly in our current age ignorance does not blind us from our likely future only chest thumping nationalism seems to do that.