Inflation

Bill Bonner has an interesting comment about wealth transfer under loose monetary policy.

Wealth can be increased or decreased. But it takes work, savings, and time. And at any given moment, the quantities of tractors, ham sandwiches, and Van Gogh paintings are fixed.

So if the stock market added $10 trillion to the wealth of equity owners, it had to subtract $10 trillion from the wealth of people who don’t own equities. That is the essential scam, and injustice, of the fake-money system.

In an honest market, if the price of some things go up, the price of others will fall in response to the shift in demand. Under monetary expansion, the compensating price decline does not occur. Those on fixed incomes are made worse off. Also those whose wages do not keep up. I explain more at Inflation.