this post was submitted on 31 May 2024
1 points (100.0% liked)
Personal Finance
3739 readers
1 users here now
Learn about budgeting, saving, getting out of debt, credit, investing, and retirement planning. Join our community, read the PF Wiki, and get on top of your finances!
Note: This community is not region centric, so if you are posting anything specific to a certain region, kindly specify that in the title (something like [USA], [EU], [AUS] etc.)
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The US is saying 3.4% because inflation is based on a consumer price index. It's not a good metric because it doesn't account for housing, education, healthcare and most other major expenses.
However, gold is an awful metric for the value of the currency. No single product can be a good metric alone. And gold is famously effected by speculation. People buy gold when the future of the currency seems uncertain.
Exactly. People buy gold when the future of the currency seems uncertain. And yet, the simple moving average of gold has risen 7.1% since January 1st of 2024. And so if inflation continues, at the pace it is, then it will be 14.2% by the time December 31st rolls around.
I’ll accept without evidence that real inflation feels a lot higher than 3.4%, but proposing short term shifts in the price of gold, or any other single commodity as a better metric is just nuts.
Well, shadow stats agrees with me. According to the way they measured inflation in the 1980s, we are about 12%. So even if my estimate was wrong, it's not off by far.
And the way they measured back then included things such as, oh, I don't know, food and energy, which are two things everybody just happens to need.
Bruh.
Did the USD deflate significantly between 2012 and 2016? Your gold based metric says yes.
From what I remember, those years were pretty steady and didn't do much.
You’re speculating on what gold will be worth in six months. You have no idea if the current trends will hold or not. It’s not like the value of gold over the course of the past hundred years is a steady consistent climb. Past performance isn’t always indicative of future results.
You do have a point there. However, I would also point out that even the government inflation numbers say they are barely dropping and yet rates are the highest they've been in 20 years and the banking sector is going to have a big meltdown because of this commercial real estate. So yeah, it's speculation, but it's speculation based on data and trends.