[freejulian]

I don’t think anyone claimed the value of a dollar was constant. Even on the gold standard there were periods of inflation and deflation. The average value over time was stable though.

[skookumchuck]

That's right, it averaged out to net zero over more than a century. Afterwards, it steadily declined in value to 4 cents.

It's a fundamentally different behavior, both in direction and magnitude.

[bildung]

> That's right, it averaged out to net zero over more than a century.

It just averages out because you selected an arbitrary period, which makes the point essentially meaningless. Id didn't average out from 1800 to 1900, from 1814 to 1914, from 1800 to 1850 and so on.

> It's a fundamentally different behavior, both in direction and magnitude.

Again, this is not correct. If you look at the actual data, you can see that the the inflationary periods in the 20th century actually have smaller inflation per year than those in the 19th century. The fundamental difference is the absence of severe deflationary crises, of which there were plenty in the 19th century. The top ten highest inflation rates of the last 200 years were all in the 19th century. Have a look at the data: http://www.in2013dollars.com/1800-dollars-in-2016

[bildung]

No, it wasn't stable. I have linked the actual data, please have a look. It was only stable if you select arbitrary time periods to make it look stable.

[freejulian]

Looks to me like it fluctuates around a specific level... which is pretty much what I said: periods of inflation and deflation.

[bildung]

I'm flabbergasted how you can call 25% inflation in a single year stable.

For context, you should look at the specific dates of the actual crises. Those were severe economic shocks. Incredibly high human costs.

And those types of crisis are all gone. The 2008 crisis was a tiny blip in comparison.

Is there any kind of data that can shake your view on economics? Or is that more akin to faith for you?