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Comment by MattGaiser | Hacker News Reader

We are still waiting for the surge of inflation you inflation hawks complained about in 2008 when this was all last done...

https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/inflation/current-infl...

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All the inflation went into healthcare, education, housing, stock market, all things conveniently not measured or heavily weighted by the PCE.

wasn't that injection more like a loan that was paid back? IIRC we actually made a tiny profit on it. but this time they are just given it away or some terms that amount to it. so eventually there is a bigger chance of it. but then BOJ has been purchasing stocks for what a decade now and japan still does not has that level of inflation.

Between 2/3rds and 3/4ths were paid off. The current administration has been quite lax about paying off debt, instead pumping money into the market like jet fuel in 2018 and 2019.

I'm not worried about inflation. Most people do not understand how it works yet assume they understand it. Inflation is a complex subject.

Inflation was seen in asset prices. We're seeing it again in asset prices right now.

He did specifically say asset bubble. And look at how much the stock market has grown since 2008. It has outpaced CPI by a huge margin.

Annualized S&P 500 Return with Dividends Reinvested from april 2008 to april 2020 are 8.285% [0] which is entirely in line with historical returns [1]. How is that an asset bubble?

[0]: https://dqydj.com/sp-500-return-calculator/

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%26P_500_Index#Performance

There was an asset bubble in property, and you can argue that there still is (there is in my city). However, wages aren't going up, as someone else below pointed out. Inflation to some degree is a race between income and spending power, right? If incomes stay stagnant but house prices double in cost, that's downward pressure on that asset.

The stock market is a different beast. Is it accurate to call it inflation if the asset inflation is "going there"?

Both health care costs and education costs - both mentioned as evidence of inflation someplace and two more places where excess inflation to be "going there" - have been making headlines before this crisis, and I bet they'll become even more prominent after the crisis ends. There will be downward pressure on prices politically on those two things, is my prediction.

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