At least in the US, we would also need extensive regulations and caps on the cost of products. As a commonly cited example, when Pell Grants (Federal student subsidies) were increased to adjust for inflation and costs of living somewhat recently, average costs of tuition went up by about the same amount across nearly all colleges.
This is a classic move in our economy: 1) product or service slowly becomes more expensive relative to income, 2) a subsidy that was supposed to go to the bottom tier to help even the playing field but is now used by more and more people due to 1 adjusts it's payout to return to it's planned effectiveness, then 3) product or service operator notices that consumers have more available money and adjusts their cost upwards.
Similar effects have been observed in more nuanced ways, like the costs of fresh fruits and vegetables being higher than boxed and processed foods, so low income food subsidy programs bump their monetary payouts to encourage purchasing of fresh foods, and some boxed or processed foods have a statistically unusual bump in retail prices in the area. This is the kind of bullshit that really starts to make me think that the USA needs a secondary monetary system (not bitcoin/blockchain, and not Dollar based) to be used for redemption of welfare and entitlement benefits which would make it impossible to track between something like an increase in food stamp benefits and monetary compensation for the use of those benefits. I'm cool with Kraft thinking that Velveeta cheese "product" needs to be more expensive in our magical capatalistic society, I'm just not cool with them thinking that only because the lowest income shoppers suddenly have 5 more cents in their account every month.
This is a classic move in our economy: 1) product or service slowly becomes more expensive relative to income, 2) a subsidy that was supposed to go to the bottom tier to help even the playing field but is now used by more and more people due to 1 adjusts it's payout to return to it's planned effectiveness, then 3) product or service operator notices that consumers have more available money and adjusts their cost upwards.
Similar effects have been observed in more nuanced ways, like the costs of fresh fruits and vegetables being higher than boxed and processed foods, so low income food subsidy programs bump their monetary payouts to encourage purchasing of fresh foods, and some boxed or processed foods have a statistically unusual bump in retail prices in the area. This is the kind of bullshit that really starts to make me think that the USA needs a secondary monetary system (not bitcoin/blockchain, and not Dollar based) to be used for redemption of welfare and entitlement benefits which would make it impossible to track between something like an increase in food stamp benefits and monetary compensation for the use of those benefits. I'm cool with Kraft thinking that Velveeta cheese "product" needs to be more expensive in our magical capatalistic society, I'm just not cool with them thinking that only because the lowest income shoppers suddenly have 5 more cents in their account every month.