[generalpass]

> A surprising number of people commenting that this is an overreaction. I suggest reading this[1] and this[2] before you're so hasty to dismiss this. This is absolutely the right move (and if anything should have been done sooner).

> Also luckily the comment ranking here seems to mean your peers disagree with you.

> [1]: https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-act-today-or-peop....

> [2]: https://www.flattenthecurve.com/

I've noticed these discussions all revolve around problems related to the virus. However, these quarantine measures are also economic in their nature and I'm not seeing even the standard university economics professor trotted out in front of the press to support why this is all going to be okay.

If you are concerned about old people, consider that their investments go belly-up, their pensions funds dry up, their house goes negative equity, and they cannot physically work. How bad is for them after this happens? Because this is what is going to happen with the economy shut down.

[scurvy]

Old people are generally in bonds at this point in their life. Bonds have been on a tear lately. Their investments are doing OK.

[thorwasdfasdf]

Not the type of bonds that give returns. Anything that's yielding more than 0% real (higher than 2.5% nominal), like high yield bonds (4-5%) are way down, even high yield muni bonds are down 20% or more from their peaks.

[scurvy]

People don't buy bonds for yield any more.

[generalpass]

> Old people are generally in bonds at this point in their life. Bonds have been on a tear lately. Their investments are doing OK.

This is assuming no CPI increases from all the money creation, especially if they send the money directly to consumers, likely reducing the Cantillon effects.

And "lately" isn't after weeks or months of substantially reduced economic activity.

[nradov]

Consumer price inflation is mostly a monetary phenomenon. The increased money supply is only one side of the equation. We must also subtract the deflationary effects of debt defaults. Banks create new money by issuing loans, and when debtors default the banks are forced to write down the value of those loans. Thus money which formerly existed in the financial system vanishes.

So for the next year or so as defaults accelerate I expect that deflation will be a larger concern than inflation, and central banks will try to counter that by large, frequent injections of new money.

[generalpass]

> Consumer price inflation is mostly a monetary phenomenon. The increased money supply is only one side of the equation. We must also subtract the deflationary effects of debt defaults. Banks create new money by issuing loans, and when debtors default the banks are forced to write down the value of those loans. Thus money which formerly existed in the financial system vanishes.

> So for the next year or so as defaults accelerate I expect that deflation will be a larger concern than inflation, and central banks will try to counter that by large, frequent injections of new money.

The flow of new money creation is not evenly distributed throughout an economy, and this is called the Cantillon Effect (which can also be applied to deflation).

The new money creation has been going strong for some time now, but hasn't been flowing into sectors measured by the CPI. This has kept CPI increases relatively low in comparison to the increases.

However, send $1000 per month to every American and nearly all of that will go into sectors measured by the CPI, which will then go up.

[scurvy]

> And "lately" isn't after weeks or months of substantially reduced economic activity.

They'll be even higher if/when that happens. They're not in bonds for the interest. They're in bonds for safety and price appreciation.

[generalpass]

> > And "lately" isn't after weeks or months of substantially reduced economic activity.

> They'll be even higher if/when that happens. They're not in bonds for the interest. They're in bonds for safety and price appreciation.

Assuming someone is interested in buying those bonds, since during inflation physical assets (e.g., precious metals) tend to be what buyers prefer.

[scurvy]

That's a retro thinking back to the era of the bond vigilantes. That's gone. There's so much stuatory purchases of t-bills that will outweigh any inflationary pressure from QE4. The demand for t-bills was almost insatiable _before_ this mess. Now, it's even more.

T-bills will do just fine despite any outward appearances of inflation. BTW, would rather load up on real estate than "precious" metals. Gold is a relic from a bygone era.

[generalpass]

> That's a retro thinking back to the era of the bond vigilantes. That's gone. There's so much stuatory purchases of t-bills that will outweigh any inflationary pressure from QE4. The demand for t-bills was almost insatiable _before_ this mess. Now, it's even more.

> T-bills will do just fine despite any outward appearances of inflation. BTW, would rather load up on real estate than "precious" metals. Gold is a relic from a bygone era.

It is further back to the inflationary period of the 70s, which is the last period that there was a mass flight from dollars due to the rate of CPI increase.

Investopedia[1] states the problem related to T-Bills rather well:

> Treasuries also have to compete with inflation, which measures the pace of rising prices in the economy. Even if T-Bills are the most liquid and safest debt security in the market, fewer investors tend to buy them in times when the inflation rate is higher than the T-bill return. For example, if an investor bought a T-Bill with a 2% yield while inflation was at 3%, the investor would have a net loss on the investment when measured in real terms. As a result, T-bill prices tend to fall during inflationary periods as investors sell them and opt for higher-yielding investments.

So when the CPI is going up and dollars are being used to bid up the price of physical assets, who is buying T-Bills?

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/treasurybill.asp

[wbronitsky]

How bad is it for all these "old people" if they are dead?

It would be really nice to hear compassion instead of worry about money. How about we keep people alive, then deal with the economy? Something tells me the country that can burn $2T in less than a week will be just fine until this passes. Talking about the long term health of the economy in terms that push people out into unsafe situations, when we have a virus that kills people in 3 weeks, borders on evil.

There is one way to solve the virus problem: social isolation. There are infinite ways to solve made up economic problems we foist on ourselves.

[s1artibartfast]

>How bad is it for all these "old people" if they are dead? It would be really nice to hear compassion instead of worry about money.

Economic factors should absolutely be taken into account. Money pays for life saving medication and treatments. Tax money from the economy pays for social medicine.

For example, 280,000 EXTRA people died from cancer between 2008-2010 in the OCED. When you consider heart disease, other indications, and the rest of the world, you are talking millions of lives.

Far more people could easily die from the economic fallout in the US than the virus.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

[marnett]

Small tidbit but the Federal Reserve, which I assume is what you refer to with the statement around $2T, is a private central Bank. It is not public and it is not affiliated with the US Government or what we would typically consider a “government bailout.”

---

EDIT: as expanded on below my main intent behind the Federal Reserve <> Government affiliation remark is that the Feds decisioning and repro market fund pumping is not government affiliated.

[vajrabum]

Not affiliated with the federal government? You do know about the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 don't you? Member banks are required to buy stock in their district Federal Reserve Bank and keep a certain amount of money on "reserve" at the Fed as set by the Governors. The Fed Board of Governors is appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate.

[marnett]

My larger intent behind the affiliation remark was "The Fed pumps $1.5T into overnight repro markets" is not a Government action and it is not government money - and theoretically all decisioning Fed decisioning is to be 100% apolitical. These outrageous figures that individuals are conflating with "Wall Street Bailouts" are not government affiliated and are not government funds.

[gaogao]

Its board is appointed by the President, so you can't really say it isn't affiliated with the government to some degree.

[marnett]

You can see my reply to the above commenter. I do agree the Fed is affiliated - my intent here was that the Feds action in the repro markets, however, is not.

[Bud]

Might want to check your info; nobody "burned $2T". That was a loan.