Comments by "MarcosElMalo2" (@MarcosElMalo2) on "Things I (Do) Worry About: Deflation || Peter Zeihan" video.

Listen again to Pete’s explanation of the different mechanisms of each long term trend. Inflation moves towards a new equilibrium between supply and demand. Deflation self-reinforces because it reduces demand which has a negative effect on supply, which in turn reduces demand further. It’s a vicious cycle. Now the equilibrium Peter talks about is misleading, because it suggests a static point of balance, like the fulcrum on a scale. The truth is that it’s a range, not a point. Low inflation means the range shifts more slowly and change is more manageable. We don’t reach a perfect balance, but relative balance without wild swings (hopefully). I don’t know how well I explained that, so watch Pete’s explanation again. You say you don’t understand economics, but you can and should remedy that. I understand your resistance. It seems boring and overly difficult to study it. It can make you feel dumb at first to tackle a new subject. But you’re not dumb. It might take time and effort, but you can spread that effort by studying 20-30 minutes a day. There are free university lectures online. It might be worth it to buy a used copy of an economics 101 textbook (you don’t have to buy a new copy of the newest edition).
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@beibei93 It’s not. But reversing population decline is a tricky thing.
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Greater efficiency is not deflationary. People are actually spending more dollars than previously for computing power because computing power became cheaper—it has become almost a consumer commodity. Technology creates new demand.
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@alexandersims1613 I don’t know if I agree with your solutions, but you made an important point. The economy is a machine. More specifically, it is an engine. You are proposing making adjustments to the engine. When we have this common framework, that the economy is an engine, we have a basis for debating policy, i.e., how to make adjustments, improvements, and tweaks to the engine. We also have a framework for a more fundamental debate: to what purpose are we using the engine? Are we moving ourselves forward with the engine? Or do only a tiny percentage of us get a luxury ride while the rest of us must walk? Capitalism is a social technology (an engine) that propels this vehicle we call society. Once we decide the purpose of the vehicle (should it carry the bulk of us or only a chosen few? Do we care if people get left behind? Do we want a race car, a luxury sedan, or a bus?), we can then make the adjustments to the engine that would best serve our purpose. And now we can have our economic policy debate, and we can base our arguments on historical fact and experimental data rather than emotion and quasi-religious dogma (capitalism is NOT a religion), etc. We can debate where we are going and how to get there. Anyway, I think you’ve found a good mode of thinking, a conceptual model that most people can understand. It’s a good analogy. The economy IS a machine, and machines are tools that we use to do work. Machines should serve us. Anyone who suggests we should serve the machine, who is turning capitalism into a religion, is trying to create a dogma to conceal their real intentions.
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@coonhound_pharoah That’s not inflation, that’s overvaluation and betting “stonks go up” always and consistently. It’s a lot of people playing the “greater fool” game with the unrealistic expectation that they aren’t the fool. It’s VCs who should know better buying their own BS and buying the BS of the grifters selling “the next hot thing” because they want to own the next unicorn. It’s FOMO.
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@renaissance17 Yup. Catcanair’s explanation seems almost tautological, because he’s placing all the value on an abstraction (currency). Value is more complicated than that. I’m not saying he’s full of shit, but I think it’s a bad and incomplete explanation without going into demand and utility.
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Give Patrick Boyle a shot. His videos are lengthy, but worth it. Also, you can play his videos at 1.25 speed and still catch what he’s saying.
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Honestly, you’re much better off just listening to Sal. Peter has a fair bit of fundamental knowledge, but falls short on the details. He makes mistakes that Sal wouldn’t allow to pass. However, Peter would benefit from some private tutoring from Sal.
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@michaeldavis3819 wages rise and fall according to demand as well. “The Market” doesn’t care if people can make ends meet. The Market is a mechanism that values supply and demand. Wages go up when there is more demand for workers. This is why a small amount of inflation is good and a small amount of unemployment is good. You might think that zero inflation is good or zero unemployment is good, but really they’re not (if they were actually achievable). Managed inflation is preferable to unmanaged inflation or deflation. Full employment suggests that demand exceeds supply, which is inflationary. It can be too inflationary if there’s no way to increase supply (i.e., create more workers).
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@redo3138 Nah, I’ll wait until the day after tomorrow or next week. 😂 Or I’ll just keep waiting society crumbles. High housing prices are definitely a problem, but the OP’s solution is frikkin retarded.
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@abdeslamkallis533 This is why you should study the boring topic of trade policy and not leave it to those with an agenda.
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Are you worried about rising prices or the rate of the rise?
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@iSlowhands Pete also mentioned government putting its finger on the scale. This isn’t an inherently bad thing, but it can be abused. Printing money isn’t the problem. Printing too much (or not enough) is the problem. This is why you want careful but not overly timid monetary policy managers and representatives that can think long term.
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Open markets are good, but the term “free market” seems like a version of the Christian Heaven or the Marxist Workers’ Paradise. Capitalism as dogma is like any other religion: designed to benefit a very few. Instead, view capitalism as a social tool that creates value and (over the long term) distributes goods and services most efficiently. So far it’s the best tool we have for that purpose, although it could be improved. Socialism is also an economic tool. Do you know how to improve socialism? You make it more like capitalism, and you keep improving it until it IS capitalism.
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@johns9969 You’re crying and moaning about the cushion because you’re ignorant to how hard you might hit without the cushion. You’re blaming the weather on the people handing out umbrellas. When you don’t understand the cyclic nature of the problem, you’re not going not solve the problem.
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That isn’t actually happening.
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