It's just gaslighting to try and convince people that the economy is still doing well despite their personal experience to the contrary.

Why buy now, after all, if you can purchase what you want — cars, furniture, appliances, vacations — at a lower price later?

That is insane 😂

businesses would face intense pressure to cut prices even more

What?? I thought competition driving prices down was the main argument for capitalism!

Its so obvious these gentlemen are financed by monopolistas lol

It's so fucking disgusting the way economists weaponize certain parts of language in order to make a good thing look bad.

Of course deflation over a very long period of time is very bad. It's one of the reasons that cryptocurrencies are so crazy.

But obviously, if the price of food went down to the price it was before inflation, that's not a bad thing. That just means you can fucking afford shit again.

This one boiled my blood. I'll tell you what, once you become class conscious, it's really hard to fucking ignore that every economist is getting you to work against your own best interests.

The inflation thing reminded me of our wages here. Over here in Belgium, most people's wages are tied to inflation (and deflation, actually). Companies keep nagging about it, sometimes saying: 'but what about deflation??? Your wage would decline!!!!' Since it got implemented we had one entire QUARTER (not even year) of deflation. The rest was inflation.

The whole "consumers spend less" argument is so fucking idiotic. The consumption of items like food, energy and water cannot be delayed. Deflation for their prices will not impact consumer spending.

As for the consumption of durables, even if their consumption gets delayed, it cannot be delayed indefinitely. If people plan to buy TVs 1 year from now instead of today, then they will save money. If capitalists predict that people want to buy TVs 1 year from now, they will borrow this saved money from the banks and use it to boost TV production. Then 1 year from now, the exchange happens and everyone is happy. This is literally supposed to be how capitalism plans production. The very fact that economists are afraid of deflation shows that they don't have the slightest faith in the system to plan for the future.

The whole drama about deflation and spending money now exists purely because capitalism can only respond to immediate signals. Its ability to plan ahead is terrible (not as if its ability to react to shortages/gluts today is any good).

In a centrally planned economy where monetary accounting has been replaced by labor time accounting, deflation is the natural tendency (as greater automation reduces labor time). Such an economy will have to plan for production on a larger time frame. If you were allowed to pre-order things in such an economy, it would be a relatively easy way to estimate demand for the future.

You are braver than me, no way I could read that shit first thing in the morning, not good for my heart to start the day in a seething blinding rage

Think about this, we will never get told that we're in a recession, or that inflation is a runaway, but we're in a convenience store. Typical working-class tradition is you get your snack and your drink for the day at a convenience store. Packs of peanuts are usually two for a dollar, or one for 59 cents. They've been this price for such a long time that I'm kind of flabbergasted they changed it. Those same packs of peanuts? One for $1.59, or two for $3.00. Let me get this straight, there's no inflation, there's no recession, but also your money goes one-third the way it used to. Keep in mind these are prices from from like 2016, not even 10 years ago.. One dollar in 2016 feels like 30 cents today.

How in the absolute fuck am I going to plan for my future in a country where the money is losing value at such a rapid pace? As far as I'm concerned, if you're saving money, that's dumb, because your money's losing value. You're never going to beat the "real"l inflation rates. I haven't even been in the workforce for 10 years, and I can tell you one thing, things aren't going to get any better.

I have a feeling that the government doesn't want us to think, "hey, yeah, we don't need to be saving money because it's going to lose value faster than it'll accrue it, so we need to be spending, spending, spending" because I'm pretty sure that's what causes hyperinflation. I'm not an economist, I'm just some guy, though, and hyperinflation tends to kill your country, your empire, so we'll see.

There won't ever be a recession so long as certain goods that are put into the consumer price index keep it going down. It's like, sure, you can't afford your groceries, you can't afford to eat, but you can go buy a new TV for cheaper than you could ten years ago. So inflation is technically non-existent. But you can't eat TVs, you can eat the rich.

Call me an idiot or economically ignorant, but wouldn’t people spend more often when prices are low? Aren’t people more frugal when prices are high? I thought low prices encouraged people to buy more…