Post
Topic
Board Politics & Society
Re: Is Inflation a Hidden Tax on the Public by the Government?
by
PrimeNumber7
on 28/05/2019, 06:23:09 UTC
Inflation is bad, but it is an necessary evil in order to keep economies going at a reasonable pace. I am talking about low/mild inflation, Venezuela level, or even high level inflation is very bad and should be avoided at all costs.

The alternative to inflation is deflation, that is when prices of goods and services fall over time. This sounds good, but it creates a spiral effect of ever decreasing prices and economic contraction. For example, with deflation, if a refrigerator costs $2,000 today, and is estimated to cost $1975 in six months, and $1950 in a year, if your refrigerator is old, and should be replaced soon, and you can afford to replace it today, you will wait as long as you can to replace it so you can save the $25 or $50. The delayed purchase means less work for the people in the refrigerator factory, and for the refrigerator salesmen. The decreased amount of work will often exceed the amount of savings a customer would realize by delaying his purchase. This means in addition to delaying purchases due to anticipated future price declines, those in the refrigerator industry will spend even less to be additionally frugal out of necessity.

When an economy sees deflation, all goods and services as a whole see declining prices, so the above example would be expanded into the entire economy.