One really big thing I want to see in my lifetime - the mainstream acceptance that the central bank *simply cannot* fix inflation by raising rates.
It’s utter lunacy and it hurts millions of people. And it just doesn’t work.
One really big thing I want to see in my lifetime - the mainstream acceptance that the central bank *simply cannot* fix inflation by raising rates.
It’s utter lunacy and it hurts millions of people. And it just doesn’t work.
@stephengentle in fairness to the RBA, they get the headlines because they're legally required to manage interest rates to combat inflation. They have basically one tool.
They're supposed to be supported by a functional government implementing sensible fiscal policies like, I don't know, addressing housing affordability by removing tax breaks for the wealthy, or addressing cost of living issues by breaking up our many monopolies/duopolies, etc.
The problem is that there's no requirement for government to be more useful than a barbed-wire canoe so that doesn't happen.
I mean, we have a lot of oil and gas here. Weird how we're so impacted by oil being shipped from other parts of the world. Surely we're not being taken for a ride for the benefit of oil and gas companies.
Oh well, I'm sure we'll at least be getting a major budget lift from all the tax we earn on our suddenly very profitable exports...
@dashlion @stephengentle Exactly right.
Interest rates are the tool for managing demand pull inflation, but are at best ineffective (and may even exacerbate) supply shock inflation.
Shame we have the latter not the former...