• HelloThere@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    Pssst, when you have increasing prices and record profits, that’s not inflation, it’s price gouging.

    If this was a true inflationary cycle, the profits would have been eroded too.

    • mackwinston@feddit.uk
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      1 year ago

      It is inflation. Inflation is literally too much money chasing too few goods - if there’s sufficient supply of goods (or insufficient supply of money) price gouging literally cannot happen. Outside of illegal acts such as collusion, price gouging is a symptom of too much money chasing too few goods.

      • HelloThere@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        I agree inflation is caused by changes in the money supply.

        QE is one way of doing that, but also is shifting the use of existing money, eg if you buy less derivatives, and more commodities.

        To clarify, this is because purchasing derivatives has the effect of temporarily removing money from the money supply because the units are created, and destroyed, when purchased and sold. Derivatives are effectively infinite, as opposed to commodities which are finite.

        As such you can cause inflation through changes in demand and/or supply of certain critical commodities which have onward effects. This is one of the factors we are seeing with the supply of gas, causing higher energy costs, causing higher manufacturing costs, higher transport costs, etc.

        However, if you look at companies like ISPs, phone networks, etc, you see they have contractual terms which state RPI+x%. If we are generous and say that their costs do increase in like with others, aka inflation, then the x% extra is still pure profit. I would class this as price gouging, especially when so many companies in the same space have the same clauses, it’s almost tacit collusion.

        I’m not saying that this is the only factor, but companies who are posting record profits are, by definition, increasing revenue faster than costs, meaning that inflation it is not just inflation. If it was, their costs would raise at the same rate and profit (as a %) would be flat.

    • Bernie Ecclestoned@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Why? Retailers work on gross margin. Not seen anything outside the energy industry that looks like gouging

      Greedflation has been debunked

      Inflation is the result of economic policy mistakes and war, not corporate avarice

      Ms Lagarde has said that it would be desirable for profit margins in the euro zone to fall. She is right; such a decline would be disinflationary and would restore workers’ share of the economic pie. But that does not mean that a crackdown on corporate greed is needed. Instead, monetary and fiscal policymakers need to continue to correct the error of excessive stimulus by raising interest rates and tightening fiscal policy.

      The right lesson to draw from the past two years is not that companies have got greedier, but that workers suffer when policymakers let inflation run out of control. All the more reason, in short, to care about price stability in the first place. ■

      https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/07/06/greedflation-is-a-nonsense-idea

      • HelloThere@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Ah, I didn’t realise it was you, I’ve learnt my lesson not to bother arguing basic economics with you.

        Btw, that economist article contradicts your first comment. But you do you hun.

        • Bernie Ecclestoned@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          Lol, superiorly incorrect. Nice mix, and with an ad hominum straight off the bat. Bravo!

          You said:

          Pssst, when you have increasing prices and record profits, that’s not inflation, it’s price gouging.

          That’s literally what inflation is, unless you prefer the monetary theorists version, like I do, to say that increasing M2 money supply is actually inflation.

          How does it contradict my first comment? Or do you not understand gross margin?

          Edit. I guess not.

          • HelloThere@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            It’s not an ad hominem to say “given my experience last time I tried to discuss economics with you, I’m choosing to not do it again”.

            • Bernie Ecclestoned@sh.itjust.works
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              1 year ago

              And yet you can’t answer my questions… I think it might be you that doesn’t understand basic economics

              I don’t recall our previous conversation either