
Has to Be a Joke, Because If It’s Not - erentz
https://alhambrapartners.com/2020/08/27/this-has-to-be-a-joke-because-if-its-not/
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aaronharnly
The article assumes a shared context of facts and interpretation that makes it
unreadable for someone encountering it for the first time.

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freeone3000
While the Federal Reserve talks a lot about how its rate policies have
improved the economy, actual figures from inflation and unemployment don't
back up any of the improvements they're claiming, and haven't for years. Now,
the Fed is moving the goalposts -- saying low unemployment can no longer be a
reason for a rate increase, only inflation, since inflation has also stayed
lower than the target metric. As inflation generally rises when people have
more money to spend, this implies that even though the unemployment figures
are way down, and the stock market is way up, people and businesses aren't
actually spending any more money. Why not? Simplest answer is "they don't have
money to spend".

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nojokes
Yes, all this money "printing" appears to inflate only asset prices. It is a
great generator of inequality.

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enricozb
How do I go from not understanding economics/finance, to pretending to
understand it? I feel like that finance uniquely is a field that every time I
have tried to penetrate I get a mix of unintelligible jargon and mathematics
as a facade of rigor.

I am comfortable reading both math and programming textbooks, but every
finance book I've picked up so far seems to quickly not make any sense to me
at all.

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bsenftner
I have an MBA in Finance, and after getting to the bottom of the math, it's
all just bare faced gambling, dressed up with $10 words. I really wish I could
say it was not, but this blog analysis of the Fed and the attitude it voices
is spot on. The Economists of the world are fucking idiots.

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me_me_me
I have recently finished 'Lost in Math'.

And that was one of the points, apparently physicists switching to economists
say math is simplistic and superflous.

Math is math, but it can be used as a window dressing for you opinions.

On the other hand if your field pretends to be science. Also creates and
awards itself a Nobel prize and pretends its an actual thing. Well maybe its a
sign of a con.

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bsenftner
Tip of the iceberg: [https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300249873/whats-
wrong-ec...](https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300249873/whats-wrong-
economics) There are also multiple Economist blogs lamenting the overly cruel
politics of the industry.

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jdfr
The beginning of the text feels really odd, almost GPT-3-like at some points.
At least, that's the way it seems when you do not know the jargon. It just
rambles on and on. Thankfully it gets more coherent later on, but I am not
sure what the author intended to say in this piece.

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MidnightRaver
That "we're going to allow even bigger than 2% inflation" is the bullshit of
bullshits because they've never even been able to hit that 2. Means all the
printing's been useless and things are going to shit. (or have already)

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ponker
Can anyone summarize this in a more accessible way?

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EdwardDiego
Paraphrasing article: US monetary policy has failed consistently because it is
predicated on a rise in inflation caused by decreases in the unemployment
rate, but this hasn't occurred - probably because the unemployment rate (or
how its measured) doesn't correctly capture the change in spending power in
the labour market. /Paraphrasing

It's kinda the same in my country - for the statistical purposes of the
official Statistics Department unemployment rate, you are no longer unemployed
if you a) work 1 hour a week or b) _have actively stopped seeking employment_.

I guess it's designed that way according to international best practice or
something, but it means we have rather odd situations where the unemployment
rate decreases, but the amount of people seeking income support increases.

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qppo
US monetary policy has not "failed" pretty much since Nixon. Janet Yellen's
tenure is really the only blemish, but only because she didn't raise rates
when we could have.

I think you're confusing the "Dual Mandate" of the Fed to minimize inflation
and maximize employment with some misplaced belief in economics. Every
American economist of the last century has realized these are often competing
ideals. It's their raison d'etre, without it the Fed doesn't exist.

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freeone3000
And yet somehow they have in fact kept inflation at less than 2% while
bringing unemployment to near zero (well, pre-pandemic, as the rest of the
article, this year's numbers are screwy). That's weird, right? What's up with
that?

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qppo
That has more to do with globalization and how we measure inflation and
unemployment than monetary policy. If you look at markets that aren't
influenced as highly by global trade (like housing, healthcare, and education)
they are greatly inflated.

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adaisadais
The dollar is gonna get f’d. Maybe Thomas Jefferson was right about central
banks after all... probably not.

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coldtea
> _As I’ve written here, there’s even more to write about this utter stupidity
> and I’ve put together a good deal of it already today for publication
> tomorrow._

Hopefully with more clarity, as this is opaque and suggestive as duck (sic)...

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mdoms
I feel like this needs some back story.

