Imagine for a minute that you live on an island where everyone is self-sufficient, except for housing, and everyone needs to buy a house.
Say there are 100 people who need to buy houses, and they use sea shells as currency, and there's 100 sea shells, and 100 homes.
It's safe to say that a house might cost one sea shell.
Let's say that there's a big storm that washes a bunch of new sea shells onto the beach, and suddenly someone finds 100 more sea shells.
Now there are 100 people who need to buy 100 homes, but there's 200 sea shells. We're rich!
At this point, it's safe to say that the house might cost two sea shells. Everything is in equilibrium.
But let's say we freak out and say "Housing doubled! We need to do something!" and they implement price controls so houses cost one sea shell.
We have a problem: There are 100 people and 100 houses, but there's enough sea shells out there to buy two houses for every person on the island.
Some people may buy more than one house, and other people won't be able to get a house. The increase in money supply and the fixing of prices at below market rates results in inequality and shortages.
Say there are 100 people who need to buy houses, and they use sea shells as currency, and there's 100 sea shells, and 100 homes.
It's safe to say that a house might cost one sea shell.
Let's say that there's a big storm that washes a bunch of new sea shells onto the beach, and suddenly someone finds 100 more sea shells.
Now there are 100 people who need to buy 100 homes, but there's 200 sea shells. We're rich!
At this point, it's safe to say that the house might cost two sea shells. Everything is in equilibrium.
But let's say we freak out and say "Housing doubled! We need to do something!" and they implement price controls so houses cost one sea shell.
We have a problem: There are 100 people and 100 houses, but there's enough sea shells out there to buy two houses for every person on the island.
Some people may buy more than one house, and other people won't be able to get a house. The increase in money supply and the fixing of prices at below market rates results in inequality and shortages.
@cy The exact scenario I described is occurring in several South American countries right now. I've got Venezuelan bolivars on my wall, and since I put them up there several years ago the currency has only gone up a million percent -- and that isn't hyperbole. They keep dropping more 0s off the notes so it isn't as obvious that there's more money in circulation. I'm a Zimbabwean multi-trillionaire, I've got every denomination from one dollar to 100 trillion dollars on the wall as well. They were just more honest about it and didn't bother dropping the extra zeroes.
Venezuela got price controls as well, but the problem is the same: Too many bolivars chasing too few things. And people starve despite having full wallets.
Central planning doesn't work. Politicians want to promise you everything you've ever dreamed of to get into power and stay in power, but the reality is there's a limited amount of stuff and a limited ability to produce stuff, and you can't magic that away by printing more money. All you can do is make everything more expensive. There is no magic wand, and every time they promise a magic wand, suffering follows.
The problem right now is there's too much money and not enough stuff. Companies would be happy to have more stuff to sell, but it just doesn't exist. Central planners shut down most of the economy in the name of protecting us from COVID, then handed everyone giant wads of cash to buy what remained.
Price is the distributed feedback mechanism to make sure there's enough stuff for the amount of money out there. If more stuff is produced and the money supply stays the same, then the prices of the stuff will generally drop because there's more stuff for the amount of money available. If less stuff is produced and the money supply stays the same, then the price of each thing will go up, because there's less stuff for the amount of money available.
If you don't like that the prices are going up as you have more money chasing a smaller amount of stuff and try to stop that mechanism by implementing price controls, then the shelves will always be empty whether you nationalize industry or not, because there will be too many dollars for the stuff available. There are plenty of socialist countries that nationalized and still weren't able to keep food on people's tables.
There are two solutions that both need to take place: First, the money supply needs to shrink. this will mean increasing interest rates and taking money out of the economy. It will hurt a lot, but it's the only way that's been proven to work. Second, let prices go where they need to. If prices go up and there's a reason to make money, then individuals and companies will invest in new productive capacity to ensure they can get that money. In this way, it is said that "the solution to high prices is high prices". Once the new productive capacity is in place, prices fall because there's more stuff chasing the money.
The current solution we're discussing is the opposite of effective policy: Increasing the money supply further to make sure there's lots of dollars to buy stuff, and price controls to make sure there's no reason to bother investing in productive capacity to make more stuff.
You end up with a full wallet and an empty belly.
Venezuela got price controls as well, but the problem is the same: Too many bolivars chasing too few things. And people starve despite having full wallets.
Central planning doesn't work. Politicians want to promise you everything you've ever dreamed of to get into power and stay in power, but the reality is there's a limited amount of stuff and a limited ability to produce stuff, and you can't magic that away by printing more money. All you can do is make everything more expensive. There is no magic wand, and every time they promise a magic wand, suffering follows.
The problem right now is there's too much money and not enough stuff. Companies would be happy to have more stuff to sell, but it just doesn't exist. Central planners shut down most of the economy in the name of protecting us from COVID, then handed everyone giant wads of cash to buy what remained.
Price is the distributed feedback mechanism to make sure there's enough stuff for the amount of money out there. If more stuff is produced and the money supply stays the same, then the prices of the stuff will generally drop because there's more stuff for the amount of money available. If less stuff is produced and the money supply stays the same, then the price of each thing will go up, because there's less stuff for the amount of money available.
If you don't like that the prices are going up as you have more money chasing a smaller amount of stuff and try to stop that mechanism by implementing price controls, then the shelves will always be empty whether you nationalize industry or not, because there will be too many dollars for the stuff available. There are plenty of socialist countries that nationalized and still weren't able to keep food on people's tables.
There are two solutions that both need to take place: First, the money supply needs to shrink. this will mean increasing interest rates and taking money out of the economy. It will hurt a lot, but it's the only way that's been proven to work. Second, let prices go where they need to. If prices go up and there's a reason to make money, then individuals and companies will invest in new productive capacity to ensure they can get that money. In this way, it is said that "the solution to high prices is high prices". Once the new productive capacity is in place, prices fall because there's more stuff chasing the money.
The current solution we're discussing is the opposite of effective policy: Increasing the money supply further to make sure there's lots of dollars to buy stuff, and price controls to make sure there's no reason to bother investing in productive capacity to make more stuff.
You end up with a full wallet and an empty belly.
@RustyCrab @parisc @Sterence @dioma So odd, back in 1999 as a high school student making video games using crappy old tools I intuited that if I'm running faster than 60FPS then I should just sleep until enough time has passed to bring the FPS back down to 60FPS. The game logic was a straight line back then so you had to get through the game logic and graphics to get back to doing game logic, but the reasoning is the same if you separate your game logic and rendering into two pieces (and in fact I did a networked space game that ran game logic in a separate thread than the graphics, and I used the same solution)
I mean, games running wrong if the CPU is too fast has only been a problem since the 8MHz 8088s...
I mean, games running wrong if the CPU is too fast has only been a problem since the 8MHz 8088s...
@cy They will absolutely hurt. They are the worst possible solution to the problem.
You pump the economy full of money and cut production by fiat. Prices rise because of course they rise, a larger number of dollars are chasing a smaller amount of goods and services. Then you implement price controls. Then companies can't keep shelves remotely stocked. People suffer horribly, there will be starvation, black markets will be the only way to get basic goods, and those goods will be at an astronomical mark-up because not only is inflation worse and worse, but now your normal goods need to be sold on a black market.
It only happens every single time. In some countries it's happening right now. I have several framed currencies on my wall from the horrible times it occurred.
Then morons will come out of the woodwork and say "Nobody could have predicted this!" despite it being totally predicted years in advance by anyone who knows anything about economics.
You pump the economy full of money and cut production by fiat. Prices rise because of course they rise, a larger number of dollars are chasing a smaller amount of goods and services. Then you implement price controls. Then companies can't keep shelves remotely stocked. People suffer horribly, there will be starvation, black markets will be the only way to get basic goods, and those goods will be at an astronomical mark-up because not only is inflation worse and worse, but now your normal goods need to be sold on a black market.
It only happens every single time. In some countries it's happening right now. I have several framed currencies on my wall from the horrible times it occurred.
Then morons will come out of the woodwork and say "Nobody could have predicted this!" despite it being totally predicted years in advance by anyone who knows anything about economics.
https://web.archive.org/web/20211230175649/https://www.theguardian.com/business/commentisfree/2021/dec/29/inflation-price-controls-time-we-use-it
BAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA
The mad lads!
It's like they say the dumbest thing you've ever seen and you're like "they can't top this" AND THEN THEY DO
every tiem
BAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA
The mad lads!
It's like they say the dumbest thing you've ever seen and you're like "they can't top this" AND THEN THEY DO
every tiem
Welcome to the right side of history! Honest!
https://nitter.poast.org/INVESTMENTSHULK/status/1476602119780249601?s=20
https://nitter.poast.org/INVESTMENTSHULK/status/1476602119780249601?s=20
@boilingsteam I recently upgraded my personal blog to wordpress, and I installed the activitypub plugin.
It was very straightforward. I just installed the plug-in, and it seems to set everything up. At that point, you can subscribe to the individual contributors using @username@domain.tld
It looks like people can subscribe to the posts, and they can interact with the posts, but with all the different things I've got going on I haven't run a whole lot of testing.
It was very straightforward. I just installed the plug-in, and it seems to set everything up. At that point, you can subscribe to the individual contributors using @username@domain.tld
It looks like people can subscribe to the posts, and they can interact with the posts, but with all the different things I've got going on I haven't run a whole lot of testing.
@Nym @Vsolid okay, this is just a really stupid talking point. I've heard it before, and it's just dumb. Pressure of any fluid whether it's a gas or a liquid is going to be the height of the gas multiplied by the density of the gas multiplied by local gravity. This isn't a suggestion, it's something that is used every single day around the world for fundamental measurements. That being the case, the idea that higher pressure can't exist under lower pressure is just wrong. Fundamentally wrong. There will always be higher pressure beneath lower pressure. It's the laws of physics. Your life right now fundamentally depends on that law of physics being correct. Eventually, you reach h = 0 when you're at the top of the column of fluid, and at h = 0 you multiply it out, the pressure due to pressure head is 0.
There are examples of gases being contained by gravity as well. Sulfur hexafluoride is heavier than oxygen. If you pour sulfur hexafluoride into a container with no lid, it will remain in that container. In fact, if you make a little paper boat, the paper boat will float on the sulfur hexafluoride. There's videos on YouTube that demonstrate this. In spite of the sulfur hexafluoride being in an open container, there will be higher pressure at the bottom of the container than at the top of the container, again because of the fundamental laws of physics.
There are examples of gases being contained by gravity as well. Sulfur hexafluoride is heavier than oxygen. If you pour sulfur hexafluoride into a container with no lid, it will remain in that container. In fact, if you make a little paper boat, the paper boat will float on the sulfur hexafluoride. There's videos on YouTube that demonstrate this. In spite of the sulfur hexafluoride being in an open container, there will be higher pressure at the bottom of the container than at the top of the container, again because of the fundamental laws of physics.
@lain clearly it's cringe. First, it needed to be amended a bunch of times to include basic human rights. Second, even though it includes a bunch of basic human rights there's no enforcement mechanism so the president can just say it's unconstitutional we know it's unconstitutional we're going to do it anyway. Cringe.
@lain lol "Germany has never been associated with any sort of governments who force private companies to do things they don't want to do. Never!"
@Shinobufag Fair enough. I remember the George W. era where he said basically "be patriotic. consooooom"
@Shinobufag It can be both spending and investing. The word spend can mean to use up or expend, and that's what you're doing.
The key is to get your money out of the depreciating currency as fast as possible and into either consumables or hard assets. Even better would be if you can trick the bank into giving you a loan at a fixed rate, spend the money, and pay it back with tomorrow's devalued currency. Then the bank is effectively paying you to lend you money.
The key is to get your money out of the depreciating currency as fast as possible and into either consumables or hard assets. Even better would be if you can trick the bank into giving you a loan at a fixed rate, spend the money, and pay it back with tomorrow's devalued currency. Then the bank is effectively paying you to lend you money.
@RustyCrab @rikkatakarada @Nelagara @mactonite economics really should be a subject taught from early on. People need to understand that supply and demand is a thing, and there's no surefire thing, and market dynamics are just that -- dynamic.
If people realized that you can't just get an education and magically have a job on the other side then they might spend a little bit more thought on their future plans.
If people realized that you can't just get an education and magically have a job on the other side then they might spend a little bit more thought on their future plans.
@Shinobufag Whether we like it or not, this is unironically what people in high inflation environments do with their money. Of course it is -- If you can buy half as much tomorrow, then you'll buy everything you can today.
Smart people would use their depreciating money to buy something that will hold its value whatever the currency falls to.
Smart people would use their depreciating money to buy something that will hold its value whatever the currency falls to.
@hn100 I'll argue every day that we should go back to pre-1975 copyright terms. 14 years and another 14 years if you file an extension.
The first feature length movie with recorded dialog won't be entering the public domain until next year. *Next year*. *The first feature length movie with recorded dialog!*
The first feature length movie with recorded dialog won't be entering the public domain until next year. *Next year*. *The first feature length movie with recorded dialog!*