[eru]

> If the loan is below inflation, the loan is actually making you money...

Inflation is at most indirectly relevant here. What's important is the opportunity cost, ie what else you could do with your money.

Of course, you'd hope that there are other investments that can at least beat out inflation. But there might be much, much better investments available. (Or on the contrary, sometimes eg government bonds yield less than inflation. Yet, some people still buy them. Though much of that demand probably comes regulation all but forcing certain parties to invest in government bonds.)