I’m talking about currency not appreciating commodities, assets or investment. The US dollar, and the currencies of most western nations, is/are in fact controlled and inflate at a targeted rate.
When I think about inflation, I think about the purchasing power of money for the basket of goods I'm likely to purchase. I'm less interested in theoretical or academic concepts like the rate of growth of M2 or the velocity of money. Preserving purchasing power over time is my priority.
But the people who run the euro zone and the dollar zone have it setup for (they hope) constant mild inflation. This incentivizes a search for productive investments like ycombinator instead of hoarding treasure, which is not a productive investment