Money and Finance
- John Mauldin: Any Bonds Today?
"By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method, they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the process impoverishes...
- John Mauldin: The Quest For Certainty
The last two weeks we have been looking at the problems with models. First we touched on what I called the Economic Singularity. In physics a singularity is where the mathematical models no longer work. For example, models based on the physics of relativity...
- John Mauldin: First Deflation, Then Inflation. But The Timing…?
One of the more frequent questions I am asked in meetings or after a speech is whether I think we will have inflation or deflation. My ready answer is, “Yes.” Then I stop, which I must admit is rather fun, as the person who asked tries to digest the...
- John Mauldin: Inflation And Hyperinflation
I have had a lot of questions about my thoughts on inflation and hyperinflation of late, especially in the new “Ask Mauldin” section on www.johnmauldin.com. Unfortunately, the answer is not short and simple. The good news is that my new book has an...
- John Mauldin: O Deflation, Where Is Thy Sting?
The CPI was out this week, and it showed a continued drop in inflation. There were those who immediately pointed out that this vindicated the Fed’s move to QE2. We have to get ahead of this deflation thing, don’t we? Well, maybe, depending on how...
Money and Finance
John Mauldin: The Theology of Inflation
We begin this week with a simple pop quiz. Is inflation good or bad? Answer quickly. I’m sorry – your answer is wrong. Or rather, we can’t know if your answer is right or wrong because we are not sure what is meant by the question. We may think we know – and we may be right – but we can’t be sure, because the word inflation has different meanings for different people in different places and different times. In fact, even the same people in the same place and time can’t agree on a precise definition.
This is in part because most of us still think of economics as a science akin to physics or mathematics. Inflation is one way economists attempt to measure things. But unlike the distances between stars or atoms, or the certainty implicit in even very abstract mathematical models, our measurement of inflation is limited by and entirely dependent upon the tools we choose. In fact, the methodology we use has as much ability to determine the outcome as the actual data does. This week we begin a series on economic data with a look at inflation, but we’ll preface the series with a discussion of how economics may be more akin to philosophy or theology than the hard sciences. If you are an academic economist, you may want to move on to the next letter, unless you are capable of not taking yourself too seriously.
- John Mauldin: Any Bonds Today?
"By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method, they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the process impoverishes...
- John Mauldin: The Quest For Certainty
The last two weeks we have been looking at the problems with models. First we touched on what I called the Economic Singularity. In physics a singularity is where the mathematical models no longer work. For example, models based on the physics of relativity...
- John Mauldin: First Deflation, Then Inflation. But The Timing…?
One of the more frequent questions I am asked in meetings or after a speech is whether I think we will have inflation or deflation. My ready answer is, “Yes.” Then I stop, which I must admit is rather fun, as the person who asked tries to digest the...
- John Mauldin: Inflation And Hyperinflation
I have had a lot of questions about my thoughts on inflation and hyperinflation of late, especially in the new “Ask Mauldin” section on www.johnmauldin.com. Unfortunately, the answer is not short and simple. The good news is that my new book has an...
- John Mauldin: O Deflation, Where Is Thy Sting?
The CPI was out this week, and it showed a continued drop in inflation. There were those who immediately pointed out that this vindicated the Fed’s move to QE2. We have to get ahead of this deflation thing, don’t we? Well, maybe, depending on how...