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by mslate 2857 days ago
1. my rent

2. my healthcare bill

3 comments

Those are both problems that have nothing to do with currency or the economic concept of 'currency devaluation.'

Inflation has barely been present in the US for the last 10 years compared to historical levels.

The reason your healthcare bill and your rent have increased much faster than inflation (I'm guessing you're in the bay area) is because of US federal government failings in the case of healthcare; and in terms of rent the geographic limitations, rapid growth, and local government failings of the area you've chosen to live in.

This is the definition of currency inflation.

Goods and services costing more in my currency than they used to—and trust me, the housing hasn’t gotten any nicer, nor my healthcare services.

How has the US exchange rate against other currencies impacted your rent and healthcare bill?
You are focusing on a currency’s value relative to other currencies.

A currency can be devalued because cost of living can go up without any appreciate in quality of living—your USD buys less assets than it did in 2008.

Just because USD has been doing better than the Euro doesn’t mean inflation isn’t occurring.

This is the main issue that both the right wing gold bugs and left wing crypto anarchists don't seem to understand: Steady modest inflation is a good thing.

If there was no inflation everyone would be incentivized to just hold cash under their mattress and not invest into the economy. When you put your money in a CD or money market account hoping to keep up with (or beat) inflation that money then goes to pay payroll for corporations via the commercial paper market. When you put your money into a savings account hoping to generate interest to keep up with inflation your money gets lent to local small businesses and other people to buy mortgages. Inflation creates inertia in the economy.

We don't have an inflation problem. What we have is a wage growth problem. Crypto nor gold bars will ever do anything to solve that. The issue has nothing to do with currency.

Thats not really inflation.
My housing and the healthcare services I pay for are the same as in 2008. I now have to pay twice as much in USD for the same goods and services.

That is the definition of currency inflation.

Exchanging more for the same.

That is an adjustment of relative prices, inflation is the generalized increase in nominal prices of all goods.

There is something called "asset inflation" but its not a correct terminology.

When housing and healthcare are >50% of my expenses, how much more general does the increase have to be to be counted as “inflation”?
It has to affect your salary too, which tends to be >50% of your income.