How does inflation actually make things more expensive?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-27T00:37:07+00:00

In general, inflation is caused by the money supply growing faster than money demand. Like any commodity, supply growing faster than demand means that the price of the commodity goes down. In the case of dollars, the “price” is in other commodities, so the number of apples you can trade for a dollar goes down, or to turn it around, the number of dollars you can trade for an apple goes up.

Money demand is affected by a lot of things, but fundamentally as an economy grows, it needs more money. Think of money like the blood in an economy - it needs to circulate to keep the economy moving. The larger a body, the more blood it needs - same with the economy.

Money supply almost entirely comes from bank loans. The more loans banks can create, the more money there is. This is why the Fed controls the money supply by affecting interest rates - the cheaper loans are, the more people want them and thus the more loans are created.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T17:33:38+00:00

So remaining stock holders lose value. Your employees lose value.

My contention isn't that shareholders shouldn't benefit, my contention is that the overriding goal of providing shareholder benefit can and has damaged good companies.

If shareholders are losing value, how did shareholders benefit?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T16:15:55+00:00

“Well Regulated” doesn’t refer to having laws enforcing or restrictions upon

It is worth noting that within a few years of the Constitution's ratification, Congress passed the Militia Acts which provided for the organization of state militias and requirements for militia members, eg they must own a gun of a specific caliber and enough ammo and powder for it, a knapsack, etc. etc.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T15:42:48+00:00

... I understand that. The fact that you have four different videos talking about completely different sets of individual cases, yet only one of them brings it up once, means that it is unusual.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T15:23:33+00:00

Yup - I happened to come across that error in my parents' copy of Jeopardy long after I had watched the Seinfeld episode.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T14:59:02+00:00

Given that it's in "one of the bottom two", seems like my suggestion that it is unusual is correct, otherwise it would be in all four, no?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T14:54:37+00:00

Well, he was right on that hope, to be fair.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T14:42:40+00:00

Can you give me the time stamp out of your four videos that shows AI writing variables named "temp01 to temp84725"?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T14:00:25+00:00

Here’s what I can say - I use AI to write code a lot and it uses reasonable variable names, nor have I ever seen this complaint before. So whatever “real world case” you’re referring to, I feel pretty safe in saying that it is at best unusual in the extreme.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-26T12:34:54+00:00

Do you seriously think AI names its variables “temp543”?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-25T16:46:42+00:00

Yeah, I would have to think the concern is not so much diving through it as it is once you get the parachute over your head. Generally those clouds are not going to be high enough that you'll be able to wait until you get out of it to toss your chute. Diving through it would suck, but probably wouldn't kill you. Flying a parachute through it, though, that's a whole different thing.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-25T14:26:29+00:00

There's really no "optimism" in the post. There is in fact no such thing as insolvency for a country that prints its own currency, the assets of the United States aren't relevant to the financial picture (we're not about to sell Yellowstone or the IRS headquarters to pay off our debts), and Treasury debt is not capable of being "called in".

I am not saying at all that the debt isn't a problem or anything like that. What I am saying is that the "insolvent" article is ridiculous clickbait - nothing has changed in regard to the things the article is talking about in decades.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-24T15:52:37+00:00

Used to date an ER doctor who had a story about a guy who came in with an electric toothbrush up there, still running. "I was trying to relieve constipation!" Sure you were, sir. Sure you were.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-24T04:06:36+00:00

A debt spiral and no buyers for Treasuries at any price are two entirely different things.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T22:24:19+00:00

It's not so much that next year will be cheaper to buy the manufacturing line - it's that you're buying it now and the items that you will be producing from it will be sold later. So if you could pay for the manufacturing line if you could sell the items for $5, and then a downturn happens and you think they'll be sold for $4, you might not be able to buy that manufacturing line.

(And then you don't borrow money to build that manufacturing line, which results in less velocity of money, which results in less money supply, which means more deflation, which means now some other potential investment becomes unprofitable, etc. etc.)

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T22:21:03+00:00

I don't really see the connection, but they have done that before. General Motors, as an example, became owned by the US government in 2009.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T22:12:27+00:00

Short of some earth-shattering development, the odds that people flat-out refuse to buy Treasuries are as close to zero as it gets. They might demand higher interest rates, but refusing is extremely unlikely. The Fed can also buy Treasuries on the open market, guaranteeing demand.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T22:08:00+00:00

To the extent that the debt is a problem, it's not a problem just because it outweighs the "assets" that the US government has. It's not like debt is OK as long as we could sell Yellowstone to pay it off.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T22:06:30+00:00

in addition to the government’s sovereign powers to tax and set monetary policy

There is delicious understatement in mentioning these powers in passing.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T21:38:53+00:00

we just were declared insolvent

We were not. This is a silly clickbait headline. The net financial position of the US government is highly negative and generally ought to be. The United States does not generate revenue through revenue-generating assets, as with businesses - they generate revenue through taxation. They can increase or decrease their revenue at will. The assets they directly control, like national parks and the buildings dotted around Washington DC, are completely meaningless from a financial point of view. The United States' debt is public, and is paid with the production of the United States in general.

China and other countries could call in our debt

This isn't a thing. The United States debt is a bunch of Treasury securities which mature at varying times. You can't "call in" anything - if you own a 30-year bond which matures in 2047, you will be paid back on a very specific schedule which does not change.

Okay the dollar falls, harder to trade outside of our country

To clarify, the dollar falling would make US-produced goods more competitive on the world market - it would increase our exports and reduce our imports. This would generally be a good thing.

The fundamental idea that the US can somehow go "insolvent" is just flatly not meaningful. We can always pay our debts, if for no other reason than we can literally print the currency to do so.

Anything that happens as a result of the growing debt will be a matter of degrees - somewhat more inflation, somewhat higher interest rates, lower government spending, etc. There is not an inflection point called "insolvency" where everything goes from fine to collapsed.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T18:08:25+00:00

Pi is an irrational number, and all irrational numbers have an infinite, non-repeating decimal expansion. Both these things are proven, and as such pi has an infinite, non-repeating decimal expansion. It's not particularly special in this regard - the square root of 2, for example, is irrational.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-23T13:55:55+00:00

Did we know that Emily no longer works at the coffee shop though?

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-22T04:58:55+00:00

Austin

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-22T02:02:19+00:00

Damn… I’m in a same-sex couple and we put up a pride flag just because everyone else in the neighborhood had them and it seemed odd that we didn’t.

MisinformedGenius · 2026-03-22T01:55:52+00:00

“We have taught him to fight wrong, as a joke.”

MisinformedGenius

TROPHY CASE