I would like a discussion on the pros or cons of deflation. Please add in your 2 bits.

I do not believe that either inflation nor deflation are bad if they are predictable and within a small percentage. It is the rapid inflation and deflation or unpredictability that causes massive failures.

Deflation is inherent in the system that we live in. As humans, we try to produce everything more efficiently. It's what drives us. It frees us to deal with new or unexpected problems. Deflation across consumer is the increased production efficiency of those goods, which we should strive for.

The typical argument against deflation is that it prevents spending, which causes a collapse of the system. This argument is self-defeating: if deflation causes collapse of the system, there is no reason to hold onto the coin that causes that deflation (and therefore deflation doesn't exist). Usually deflation is blamed for economic depressions, but instead, it's normally the other way around: massive inflation had preceded these depressions until production and investment capacity had become unsustainable and untethered to real value, which caused massive distrust of such systems. That distrust then led to deflation, but deflation is the by-product of the poor preceding policies that perpetuated perennial problems, but was not the cause. Deflation can be a healthy, but painful, correction of these systems (as we see in bitcoin boom-bust cycles), while policies often try to alleviate this pain by inflating their currencies.

Another argument against deflation is that people who were first into the system benefit more than people who enter later. This happens with any system, and inflation does not remove this problem -- because the inflated amounts are normally awarded to those who maintain power over the system. In this sense, inflation is worse than deflation because it allows an artificial group to remain at the top, rather than allowing that money to be distributed throughout the system. Inflation without proper policy does not change this problem of deflation.

A usual argument is that inflation allows people to pay off their debts. This is only true if people's salaries rise with the inflationary measures, which does not keep true. The problem with inflation here is that the inflation amounts are given originally to close allies, rather than broad distribution among all classes. It is difficult to force all businesses to keep up with inflationary policies, as they must have also received inflation-related gains to be able to award their employees with further gains. For those employees to continue to receive those gains, they must have enough soft power within their organisations to argue for those gains, otherwise they do not receive higher compensations. It is far too easy for companies higher in the chain of companies to keep their inflation-given gains and not pass them on, and for companies to not pass those inflatino-given gains to their employees.

Are there other arguments to inflation or deflation? I'm interested in hearing more discussion on this. Thanks.