Like the Fed, the ECB is resisting interest rate increases despite producer and consumer prices soaring. Consumer price inflation across the Eurozone was most recently recorded at 4.9%, making the real yield on Germany’s 5-year bond minus 5.5%. But Germany’s producer prices for October rose 19.2% compared with a year ago.

First, we must define inflation: it is the increase in the quantity of money, currency, and credit. It is not an increase in prices. Changes in the general price level is the consequence of a combination in changes of the quantity of deposit currency and changes in the level of the public’s retention of deposit currency relative to their possession of goods. We can record deposits statistically, but cannot quantify human behaviour.

According to Ayn Rand’s ethics, the only basis for value is an individual’s survival as a rational being. In order to live as a rational being, you must respect the rights of others as rational beings each aiming at his own survival. As Harry Binswanger, a leading follower of Rand, explains,

Bloomberg News recently solicited advice from Argentinians who lived through that country’s high inflation on how Americans should cope with rising inflation. The Argentinians suggested Americans spend their paychecks as fast as possible to avoid future price increases. They also suggested taking out loans that can be paid back later in devalued currency.

At the heart of the Christmas story rests some important lessons concerning free enterprise, government, and the role of wealth in society.

Let’s begin with one of the most famous phrases: “There’s no room at the inn.” This phrase is often invoked as if it were a cruel and heartless dismissal of the tired travelers Joseph and Mary. Many renditions of the story conjure up images of the couple going from inn to inn only to have the owner barking at them to go away and slamming the door.

With one week left in the year, it’s time to take a look at America’s financial system as visualized through various Federal Reserve charts. This is the follow up from 2020: A Visual of the System, published this time last year.

Total Assets - $8.790 trillion

By popular thinking, the key driver of economic growth is increases in the total demand for goods and services. It is also held that the overall output increases by a multiple of the increase in expenditure by government, consumers and businesses.

As a libertarian, I have long objected to being characterized on a left-right political spectrum (as with studies of political affiliations that group libertarians with republicans or conservatives on the right). In response to inquiries about where I fit in that framework, over the years, I have taken to saying that my views were orthogonal (meaning at right angles or perpendicular) to the framework. Since almost no one knows what that word means, those I say it to are puzzled, and ask for clarification, which allows me to explain why I fit in neither category.

People who know anything at all about the demographic history of the US know that the life expectancy at birth in the United States was significantly lower in the 1940s than it is today.  In fact, this is somewhat common knowledge because most people know—or at least suspect—that if you got cancer or had a heart attack or stroke in the 1940s, you would probably die a short time later. Many also know that child mortality was also higher in the mid-twentieth century.