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Comment by coryfklein | Hacker News Reader

No! And in fact most economists consider this to be an extremist fringe theory. A quick counterfactual here is, if the US's inflation is caused by its "money printing" (a term that is used quite loosely here, the vast majority of this money never makes it out to the general economy), then how does one explain the inflation experienced in other nations at the same time where no money was printed?

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I don't think the stimulus being one of the drivers of inflation is an 'extremist fringe theory' at all. I thought the consensus was it was one of many factors, and the exact contribution of the different factors (stimulus, supply issues, etc) was up for debate.

US inflation is higher than other wealthy nations and the US also did a larger stimulus. So there is evidence that the additional stimulus may have created greater inflation in the US. Scope this paper here: [0]

As far as the consensus for the cause of inflation being unclear among experts, scope this article in left leaning VOX: [1].

[0] https://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economi...

[1] https://www.vox.com/23036340/biden-american-rescue-plan-infl...

Stimulus checks certainly had an impact on inflation! (A point I argue specifically elsewhere in this thread.)

But not the QE/printing money.

The UK didn't provide stimulus checks yet is experiencing higher inflation than the US.

Canada gave a lot more in stimulus checks (with respect to GDP) than the US but is experiencing less inflation than the US.

> The UK government has borrowed vast sums of money to fund over £400 billion ($558 billion) in stimulus during the crisis. Total government debt has soared to £2 trillion ($2.8 trillion), or close to 100% of GDP, a level not seen since the 1960s, according to the Office for National Statistics.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/03/economy/budget-2021-uk-stimul...

I am seeing other's claim it is the fractional reserve lending and commercial credit.

One other person I saw mentioned that the reserve requirement was lowered to zero in 2020. I don't think that has ever been done before.

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