Talk:Inflation

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inflation and rising prices

Several articles link to this article using the common misnotion that inflation and rising prices are synonymous. Unfortunately, this article does not clarify that popular misconception.

While inflation can cause or result in rising prices, rising prices are not necessarily the result of inflation. Rising demand causes rising prices as well. And inflation can buoy prices in the face of falling demand. Buoying prices at an artificially high level is not the same as rising prices.

The current rise in U.S. gas pump prices is not the result of a devalued or inflated dollar, nor rising demand. It's caused by a falling supply level as the result of a refinery fire.

This article does little more than restate the errant notion that the terms, "rising prices", and "inflation", are interchangeable, which they are not. This is a disservice to readers. nobs^{Corporations are people, too} 19:54, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

deflation

Likewise, deflation is not adequately described in this article. There are two types of deflation.

monetary deflation: or a contraction in the money supply. A reduction in the amount of currency and money in circulation typically led to shortages of cash and higher interest rates. This is why the Gold Standard was abandoned, because the monetary base would shrink as a result of gold exports to pay international trade balances. A shortage of cash could under some circumstances lead to higher prices -- the opposite of price deflation.

price deflation: or falling wages and prices historically was dealt with through demand side economics. Falling demand led to falling prices. Government stimulus spending was intended to create demand and the monetary base would be expanded or inflated to provide the currency for increased payrolls, increased consumer demand, higher prices, etc. nobs^{Corporations are people, too} 20:49, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Update needed?

Some of the analysis comparing the US to the Weimer Republic I feel is out of date. Apparently it was written about 9 years ago, and a lot of things have happened between now and then that requires this portion to be re-evaluated.

It's bad. I'll work on it when I have time. I'll work on it when I have time. GeeJayK (talk) 17:20, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

Clearly not every economist is in agreement with you, GJK

And before you say it, NPR is generally recognized as a reliable source. Carthage (talk) 15:42, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Clearly you didn't read the study. Or our own article. The study is there, it shows that there's evidence for inertial inflation, not for "greedflation". GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:44, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Either way that doesn't justify removing my edits. The overall effect's the same, corporate actions drive inflation at least to some degree. Also the section is called greedflation. The NPR interview involves the author of that study. It's not unreliable or fringe. Carthage (talk) 15:45, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

It does because your edits are wrong and unsourced (again, your single source provides evidence against your claim, companies didn't raise prices out of greed, companies are always greedy). Find a source that shows 1 cause and consequence. 2 That explains why companies weren't doing this same practice before. 3 An alternative to price and firm theory. Read the study if you don't believe me. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:48, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Here, from the source:

(...) [T]he markup itself is determined by a host of unobservable factors, including changes in demand but also changes in firms’ expectations of future marginal costs. The decline in markups during the first half of 2022—even as inflation remained high—is consistent with firms having raised markups during 2021 in anticipation of future cost pressures. Furthermore, the growth in markups was similar across industries with very different relative demand and inflation rates in 2021, which is also consistent with an aggregate increase in expected future marginal costs. We conclude that an increase in markups likely provides a signal that price setters expect persistent increases in their future costs of production.

And nowhere did I disagree. The article also says:

Now, you may remember a lot of economists last year saying that corporations or corporate greed was not driving inflation, but corporate profits could be a driver of inflation. It's right there in the inflation formula, says Andrew Glover at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

For context, Glover is the original author of the Kansas City Fed study. Carthage (talk) 15:53, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Glover, you know, the original author of the study, then says:

GLOVER: Let me see. It is possible that firms, by anticipating higher costs, contributed to the inflationary pressures that actually led to higher costs.

GONZALEZ: Yeah, corporations anticipating higher inflation could have been why we got higher inflation. And Andrew says this could spiral.

GLOVER: If we were to get in a situation where not only in 2021 did firms expect higher inflation but in 2022, they expected it, 2023, they expected it, then we very well could end up in a world where profits are always a major contributing force to inflation.

I mention this in my edit. You're raising a mountain out of a molehill. Carthage (talk) 15:54, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

(EC)...And his study does not provide evidence for greedflation. Nor your links. Again, this is maybe evidence for inertial inflation, not for greedflation. Can you find a study that provides answers for those three questions I made? GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:55, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Also, you don't know what molehill mountaineering is. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:56, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

"It is possible that firms, by anticipating higher costs, contributed to the inflationary pressures that actually led to higher costs." This is not support for greedflation at all. These are rational expectations, it's close to Chicago School if anything. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:58, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Although, to be fair with the Chicago School, many of them believe that inflation is always caused by monetary policy, which is also bullshit. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:02, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

(EC) Also note that Finland and the UK are not America. Either way, I added a disclaimer that corporate price-gouging is not the reason why corporate profits are contribution to inflation. Happy, now? Also, if you're presuming that I think mainstream economics is complete garbage because I'm a socialist, then you're wrong. Our own article on economics clarifies that just because mainstream economics has a normative aspect to it, to completely dismiss it because of that is fallacious. Companies act out of rational self-interest because they operate in a capitalist environment, which encourages selfishness. I don't disagree with the application of economic rationality to an obviously capitalist environment. Carthage (talk) 16:03, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

No,I still disagree. You're arguing for rational expectations, it's another topic, and it's irrelevant here. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:06, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Regarding UK and Finland, I don't see why we shouldn't talk about other countries. We have Finnish and English users too. Also, microeconic theory does not change from country to country that much, unless such countries have very different institutions, which I don't think is the case. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:08, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I presented two reliable sources, both with involvement from economists, stating that inflation in 2021 and 2022 was driven in large part by corporate profit-seeking. What is there to disagree about? Even if you disagree, obviously not every economist agrees with your conclusion. I think that's worth mentioning at the very least. Also, Finnish and British politics are very different from American politics, and sadly to say: economics is a very political beast. Carthage (talk) 16:11, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, for starters, one of your source is not arguing for greedflation, and the other is a blog post from a biased think tank (not putting the center-left EPI on the same level as the quasi-fascist Ludwig von Mises Institute, but the later also argued against greedflation and no one would say it's a reliable source). Can you please post a study answering the three questions I've asked you? GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:15, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ At least you should remove the NPR quote as it does not argue for what you're saying. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:17, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Done. Now I have some paperwork to fill out, so don't expect another response for a little bit. Carthage (talk) 16:19, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ What is actually mutually exclusive between “greedflation” and “rational expectations” exactly? I’m lost. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 16:23, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Greedflation is when firms raise their prices and cause inflation. Rational expectations, to quote Wikipedia "is an economic theory used to explain how individuals make predictions about the future based on all available information. It states that individuals will also learn from past trends and experiences in order to make the best possible prediction about what will happen. They could be wrong sometimes, but that, on average, they will be correct." Basically, firms raise their prices because they expect prices to get higher. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:26, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I can see the difference, but I don’t see how one contradicts the other. Is it not at least possible in logical principle that one can work as the mechanism for the other? It is not as if expectations of higher prices makes it impossible for that expectation to have any causal effect on future prices, right? For the record, I am ambivalent to the causes of inflation. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk)

Big study

Should we add this to our article? Definitely seems relevant. Carthage (talk) 21:38, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

(EC) I in fact checked this "big study" a couple of months ago and it's non peer-reviewed stuff from fringe think tanks. It's just a report, actually. Should we add the Adam Smith Institute response to the study?[2] Probably not. As the report does not explain 1 why firms weren't practicing "greedflation" years ago and why they suddendly stopped right now, I'd just bin it. At this point I think this whole thing is somehow too important to you, even if you don't understand some basic concepts. Please, grab a microeconomics textbook and learn how elasticity works in real life. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 21:52, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm honestly starting to think we wont get an agreement among ourselves. Could we get input from other editors going forward? Carthage (talk) 00:07, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Of course you just ignored my questions. Do whatever the fuck you want, Carthage, I won't revert or even check, from my end this conversation is over until you start arguing in good faith (and I'm not talking about this specific talk page, or at least not only about it). GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 00:35, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

I don't see how "I personally looked into it and deemed it unworthy" takes away from the study if that's the only thing you're saying whilst it not only passed peer review but then also got picked up by The Guardian and Fortune (though I wouldn't mind a link to the study in question, actually, because I can't find it). Checking the first page of google results for "Greedflation" paints a picture that leans very strongly towards "we don't know", with two observations. 1) There are numbers of articles in favor and against, and some who just state that economists disagree on the issue, and 2) is that Greedflation apparently was mostly disagreed with some time back but is gaining traction amongst experts. If we're going to have a section on Greedflation then I believe that it should reflect this. What do other users think? ULTRACOMFY (talk) 00:52, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

There is a sort of testimonial injustice happening within that kind of "I personally looked into it..." response, and attacks on peoples perceived competence as well. The decisions we make about what evidence to include should be that which is most pertinent to the topic. If broader discourse includes some line of evidence, we should include that evidence. It doesn't mean we have to present said evidence neutrally, or not include counter-evidence. We can preface things upon what the strongest evidence says, and with weaker evidence explain and point out why such evidence is weak. We do this for other topics, whether it is debunking creationist talking points, or pointing out bad studies regarding water fluoridation. We shouldn't editorialize things on the basis of only including evidence to paint a certain pre-defined narrative. The goal should not be to support a particular ideological interpretation or another, we should instead focus on what the science says. Relevancy should be deciding upon whether the point/argument is frequently appealed to in the larger discourse. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 02:46, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

@ULTRACOMFY Here's a link for ya from the Fortune article. (Archive All-Star, I am.)

I don't see how "I personally looked into it and deemed it unworthy" takes away from the study if that's the only thing you're saying whilst it not only passed peer review

That's not the only thing Gee said though. He said "it's non peer-reviewed"; and it ain't. This isn't an article published in an academic journal that was screened by other neutral academics before it was printed. It's an in-house publication from a think-tank written by two gentlemen who work for said think-tank.

also got picked up by The Guardian and Fortune

This to me seems like a strange appeal to popularity. Neither the Guardian nor Fortune are peer reviewed academic journals. The fact they deemed it worthy of publishing does not, in isolation, prove that the assertions in that study are correct. Newspapers tend to do silly things. It's print journalism, written by journalists. The fact that they thought it would get clicks is not a bar for academic integrity. - Rairyu75 (Talk) 03:23, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

@Rairyu75 @OnlySortaDumb Thank you for your inputs! I had some time to reflect on the things you're saying, and they've been very insightful.

I think it is my responsibility to address my comment about GJK to prevent further misunderstanding. My comment "I personally looked into it and deemed it unworthy" was based on the assumption that the "study" in question was actually a study held to academic standards. I felt that was a reasonable assumption at the time because it was picked up by The Guardian and Fortune. I didn't think they would publish papers that are, in terms of academic accuracy, competing on the same grounds as, say, papers from the Heritage Foundation do. To me, if that paper did pass peer review and did pass editorial standards of otherwise reputable news agencies then it would seem almost frivolous to be "some guy" on RationalWiki and say "The study is flawed" when really the study has the backup of the scientific body. Now I know that it does not, so I would no longer assign so much trust into that paper. This undue confidence in the paper is also what lead me to present that aspect so sharply, pointedly. I regret that now because, frankly, I should have known better. Sorry for that, @GeeJayK.

Secondly I would like to address what I believe is the most likely rationale behind Greedflation, because I think it explains a lot of the "why we are saying the things we are saying, and why they don't seem to make sense to each other".

1) Corporate has been making record profits since the beginning of the pandemic. Economic inequality is now greater than it was four years ago.

2) These profit increases coincide with sudden and sharp increases in prices demanded from customers/end users.^{[citation NOT needed]}

= Therefore, more money will have flowed into the companies.

3) If all that companies did was counteracting an increased flow of money out of the company, profits should have remained the same.

4) 1 and 3 contradict each other, and while we know for sure that 1 is true, 3 is merely a corporate claim. For all we know, more money has flowed in and quite obviously did NOT leave those companies anymore, which it should have if there really was as much inflation as there was price increases.

= Corporate does not just increase prices for inflation.

At this point it does not really matter to ask "why didn't they do this before" or stuff like this because we can always pull up some kind of conspiracy to explain our way out of the problem. What about "well, before covid companies could not have raised prices like they do right now because that would have generated too much backlash" or something. If you want to debunk greedflation, you need to attack this rationale.

Personally, I don't know what's true. I'm not an economist. I don't know jack about economy and need to rely on experts to make those calls for me, which explains why I treat this discussion like I would do on a Wikipedia talk page, where truth is not determined by the veracity of arguments but solely on "does a reputable publication support this statement?" (apparently I also overestimated expert consensus on greedflation. Just 7%, really?). Now, after reading several analyses, including this one by the Federal Reserve which explicitly states

Corporate profit margins were not abnormally high in the aftermath of the COVID- 19 pandemic, once fiscal and monetary interventions are accounted for. This conclusion is supported by the behavior of the net capital share, which remained well below its historical high levels, and by firm-level profit margins across different size categories, which behaved broadly in line with their pre-COVID trends. If there is any anomaly to note, it should probably be that the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic has been characterized by a persistent weakness in the profitability of middle-sized publicly traded firms.

It appears that there are multiple angles the pro-greedflation rationale doesn't take into account that seem to be able to explain quite well how the observed profit margins materialized, without invoking conspiracies like "they just now decided to gauge prices" which, admittedly, is a far grasp if you're trying to make that point. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 15:56, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

I would still assume they had some sort of quality control, and plenty of garbage passes through peer review, so while that comment holds weight, it doesn't hold as much weight as GeeJayK thinks. There are other factors to consider, and one would be forgiven for assuming a think tank possesses quality controls. GeeJayK is also placing his own personal opinion above that of multiple media outlets, which note that opinion among economists about greedflation seems to be decidedly mixed. I think that's pretty relevant to consider here.

Gee's comment about elasticity is also interesting as water, which is decidedly non-elastic (people will pay for water no matter how much you price it), has also seen rising prices.

As for why corporate profits seem to be soaring now and not decades ago, decades ago there wasn't a pandemic wreaking havoc on the global economy. So a plausible explanation is pure opportunism. Carthage (talk) 03:35, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Economists aren't "split", only 7% of them think that "greedflation" is a cause of the inflation in US.[3] Regarding the pandemic, you're free to show how it changed market power. And water, a natural monopoly, is probably the worst example you could bring, and quite frankly, resonates pretty badly on you. A natural monopoly always works on the elastic part of their demand curve. If greedflation is actually a thing, then every company should be working in their elastic part of the curve. Most companies either work in monopolistic competition, oligopolies, or in pefect competition. In these cases, while prices are not always the same as marginal costs, they cannot be much above either.GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 04:05, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

I would still assume they had some sort of quality control

As would I @Carthage, as would I. I'm sure the Institute for Public Policy Research wishes to be taken seriously, and would thus do it's homework in order to craft as persuasive and as watertight an argument as it possibly could. But it still is a political think tank with a political agenda that publishes material to support it's aims. I have no strong opinion on the matter of greedflation either way so I can't comment on it's contents, but I certainly see where Gee is coming from.

plenty of garbage passes through peer review

Aye, that it does. That it sure does, doesn't it? Peer review is still done by biased, fallible, inherently flawed human beings and spits out some inane bullshit, no doubt. But it's the best we have, and given the choice between something that was peer reviewed and something that wasn't I know which one would I pick; not because it GUARANTEED the correctness of the paper, mind, but because it (for me at least) slightly REDUCES the chance of it being garbage.

Gee's comment about elasticity is also interesting as water, which is decidedly non-elastic (people will pay for water no matter how much you price it), has also seen rising prices.

I'm no expert on the topic of economics, Carthage. Heck, I ain't even a novice. I have two years of Irish secondary school economics under my belt, but that's about it. However (and please, all of you, forgive me if I'm wrong on this, I am but a mere dilettante in everything I put my hand to) water is kind of a bad example here because, as that AARP article states:

“”America’s water infrastructure — purification plants, pumps, endless miles of underground mains and pipes, and sewage-processing facilities — is in many cases 50 to 100 years old, in some places even older. Such age leads to system breakdowns and outages, making for added maintenance, material and labor costs. Inflation also plays a part in rising water bills. “The cost of pipe has gone way up, and a lot of that is due to the same supply chain issues that we are seeing in other parts of the economy,” Bindler says.

Which is an example of "cost-push inflation" (am I remembering that term right?) where the cost of providing a good or a service increases and thus the price at which the good or service is being sold at also needs to be raised to make up for the increase in cost. The article also mentions the increasing frequency of droughts. Thus it isn't a good example of greedinflation, as the bigger bills people are facing isn't due to excessive corporate greed. - Rairyu75 (Talk) 04:14, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Also, @Carthage @GeeJayK I don't know about you two, but I'm having great fun. Reading your impassioned, articulate arguments and clicking on all the supplementary material you two are providing me with is significantly more entertaining than job hunting. The season ended in my factory, you see, so I'm unemployed right now. Have a job interview on Monday. Feeling pretty nervous. I wonder how I'm going to pay my bills if I don't succeed in getting another shitty factory job. I kinda get the sense that you two are angry at each other? Maybe I'm wrong, but if so, it seems strange. You are both so intelligent and productive here. Can't really comprehend why we would have to yell (or not have fun WHILE we yell. I quite enjoy debating).

But maybe it's just because I'm so weighed down by my real life problems right now that this all seems a bit silly and not truly important. If this is worth getting angry about for you two, if THIS is the biggest thing bothering ye right now, well, I'm pretty f@cking jealous.

Wish you both the best. - Rairyu75 (Talk) 04:34, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Something not being peer reviewed is exactly the sort of thing we could note, as a caveat, and given the status of evidence being provided by a think-tank, it can be mentioned that the information being presented is being done so for particular policy aims and its publication possibly being contingent on certain results the financial backers desire. To dismiss the evidence outright, however, that does enter into some shill gambit territory. It is the sort of thing where I think the epistemic responsible thing to do is provide comparisons/contrasts to other existing data -- expressing preference towards evidence based in the seemingly most reliable methodology. If our aim is to represent "science" then our aim should be in the representation what would be most reliably regarded as the "truth" by most public institutions and common cultural intuitions. The study being picked up by the media need not lend it any epistemic authority, but it does mean that this study is within "popular consciousness" which vindicates needing to address it. - ^{— Unsigned, by: OnlySortaDumb / talk / contribs} 05:16, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

I hope you all can consider the possibility that the other person may turn out correct. I find it hard to believe that profiteering isn't at least a factor in inflation but will admit I have more to learn about economics. Chillpilled (talk) 14:10, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Since unlike other users I'm not a bad-faith POV warrior, I'll post here a very short (only five pages) and very simple article published by an OK journal (Economic Letters)[4] that gives an interesting explanation on how the pandemic could have lead to greedflation. Unfortunately the article is paywalled, so I'll just quote it here:

The model highlights how desired markups rise in periods of greater price level uncertainty. For example, with an increasing prevalence of inflationary supply shocks, both price volatility and marginal costs rise. According to the model, a firm’s price rises for two reasons: (i) the rise in marginal costs; and (ii) the rise in the desired markup. Because they assume perfect information, standard models discount the latter channel, and thus fail to capture the amplification of price shocks. For those firms with stable marginal costs, prices still rise; consumer uncertainty alone generates market power. Furthermore, the model predicts asymmetry in price adjustment during periods of price volatility. Regardless of the state of the business cycle, the mechanism exerts upward pressure on prices and thus acts as a source of downward nominal rigidity.

A confluence of factors contributed to price level uncertainty between 2021–2022. Being accustomed to low and stable inflation, consumers were not attuned to a different inflationary environment. Moreover, a number of well-publicized events provided justification for fluctuations in the price level—and thereby raised its perceived variance. Foremost among these was the war in Ukraine, which caused substantial dislocations in food and energy markets and raised input costs. The labor supply shortages and disruptions to supply chains associated with the Covid-19 pandemic had a similar impact. Public pronouncements that inflation would be transitory, which ultimately proved inaccurate, underscored a sense of price uncertainty. Reinforcing this uncertainty was the salience of food and gas price fluctuations. Fig. 1 illustrates the increase in volatility of U.S. and Eurozone core inflation after 2020. By excluding the more volatile food and energy components, this metric conveys the broad-based nature of the price level volatility. Complementing this, Fig. 2(a) reveals the erratic nature of the monthly change in U.S. consumers’ inflationary expectations over the same period. Fig. 2(b) displays an index of consumers’ one-year ahead inflation uncertainty for the Eurozone.

I find this one much more compelling than the so-called "big study". It does not provide huge empirical evidence though, like the study by Ben Bernanke and Olivier Blanchard that I used, just an explanation of what could be going on (Economic Letters is mostly for this sort of insight). That being said, if you want to use this explanation, that there is some asymetrical information that can explain higher prices, I won't mind, it's definitely better IMO than the rest of the explanations. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:27, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

References

Some context left out

A 2023 IMF study showed that in 2015 profits actually contributed more for the Eurozone inflation than in 2022 and 2023, also arguing that the limited available data does not point to a widespread increase in markups, and that there is no evidence that would warrant substantial concerns or policy interventions in terms of competition policy.

This seems to leave some context out:

As the Chart of the Week shows, the higher inflation so far mainly reflects higher profits and import prices, with profits accounting for 45 percent of price rises since the start of 2022. That's according to our new paper, which breaks down inflation, as measured by the consumption deflator, into labor costs, import costs, taxes, and profits. Import costs accounted for about 40 percent of inflation, while labor costs accounted for 25 percent. Taxes had a slightly deflationary impact.

- [5]

Is there a reason this context was left out?^{— Unsigned, by: Carthage / talk / contribs}

Why don't you read the study? You'll see if something was left out. I did my edit based on the study. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 21:53, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

Then why didn't you include the percentages? According to the IMF itself, profits have accounted for 45% of price rises since the start of 2022. That seems relevant. Carthage (talk) 06:09, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

This getting is a bit tiresome. It is on the article, as I said, this ratio was much higher on previous years. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 16:27, 3 March 2024 (UTC)