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by VLM 3936 days ago
Boost equity prices. Putting money in mattress gets -(inflation) return, so how about stocks?

Very theoretically it sets a "you must be this tall to play" floor on stock financed capital projects. So if inflation is 4% and you think new railroad locomotives will pay off at 5% average, then you do it, or if new locos only pay off at 3% then you don't because you'd get a sub-inflation rate of return on stocks or bonds.

Another argument is its essentially a long term debt jubilee, given the extremely optimistic assumption that wages rise with inflation (LOL, not so much since the 80s or so). So at both personal and corporate level, debts as a problem kind of go away with time. A decade of 70s style wage inflation would certainly help with the student loan crisis and the real estate price crisis.