It’s not intended to be a bold statement, but nonetheless, some people seem to disagree. Even your quote above suggests this… you say that inflation will not win the day, but then in the very next sentence you give me a hard time for apparently stating the obvious when I say that the prices of things that people need will go up. Wouldn’t that be inflation? (In specific, the kind of inflation that matters — the one that concerns people’s cost of living?)[/quote]
I appreciate the point that it is the kind of inflation that matters, but I’m not so sure it is what most would consider inflation.
I’m giving you a hard time because it is not a useful prediction. After three years, certainly some things will rise in price while others will fall. With a prediction like “the things people need that are scarce will inflate” you can’t go wrong (and I’m not so sure that really constitutes a general “inflation” call). After three years, you can surely look back and say “I got it right.”
List the specific things that will inflate and the specific things that won’t and specific things that will deflate – get it right and I’ll be impressed. But saying “the things people need that are scarce will inflate” deserves me giving you a hard time because as soon as you start picking a specific basket of goods instead of a general basket of goods, you are talking about something other than inflation. You are then talking about specific commodity prices.
Then there is the whole business of “inflation” meaning money supply increase instead of dollar increase but we can just stick to prices for this discussion.
