I'd like to know more about this. I always equated printing money to inflation. Why isn't this the case? Can you point me to some good books for the same? Thanks!
The value of the dollar in terms of a constant basket of goods is a function of both supply and of "velocity." Money is only worth something if it changes hands.
Let's say the Fed prints 1 quintillion dollars, and then gives it to me. I then put it under my very big mattress. I will never spend a single one of those dollars. Has this quintillion dollar print changed the value of the dollars that are actually changing hands? It has not.
Obviously that's a contrived example but it does demonstrate the principal. If economic environmental factors are causing people to spend less money, such as unemployment or a global pandemic, then the velocity of money goes down. This in turn causes merchants to lower prices to incentivize spend. This is how deflation materializes. If they cannot lower prices fast enough to actually incentivize a consistent level of spending you enter a deflationary spiral.
Printing new money offsets the reduction in velocity, and staves off a deflationary spiral. It doesn't however guarantee a commensurate level of inflation.
You can see this on a macro scale. Since the 1970s the M2 money supply has increased 15X however inflation has only increased 7X.
Because the Fed, like most central banks, exercises a positive control mechanism, once velocity is restored, printing will slow or even go negative to ensure a consistent, predictable level of inflation.
> Let’s say the Fed prints 1 quintillion dollars, and then gives it to me. I then put it under my very big mattress. I will never spend a single one of those dollars. Has this quintillion dollar print changed the value of the dollars that are actually changing hands? It has not.
Probably, very slightly, because even if you plan to never spend them, the fact that you have a quintillion of them in your mattress probably changes the value you attach to other dollars (because, in extremis, you could break into that stash), which has an effect on the overall value of dollars (but only imperceptibly, because you are a very small part of the market.)
>Let's say the Fed prints 1 quintillion dollars, and then gives it to me. I then put it under my very big mattress. I will never spend a single one of those dollars. Has this quintillion dollar print changed the value of the dollars that are actually changing hands? It has not.
But of course no one is stupid enough to put their dollars on a mattress. They will, like everybody else, try to find a way to run from inflation, be it investing on stocks or any other assets. So your point is of course true but irrelevant.
Not at all. Its fine if that money makes its way into assets because assets are not a necessity for life. CPI is a proxy for necessity for life. If it makes its way into stocks, that's just an ROI.
Further, if that money starts making its way back out, towards CPI, the fed will stop printing or even take the money back out of the system. That's why we have a Fed.
