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At the Ron Paul Institute, former congressman and presidential candidate, Dr. Ron Paul explains that despite the worst reported inflation numbers in years, Americans are still not being told just how badly their savings are being abused. He writes (abridged):
According to numbers released by the US government, consumer prices have increased by 7.5 percent in the past year, the steepest increase since 1982.
The actual price increases are even worse than the government numbers suggest, given that the “official” statistics are manipulated to understate the real rate of price increases. According to John Williams of ShadowStats, prices have actually increased by around 15 percent over the past year.
The fact that prices remain at historically high levels shows that inflation is far from “transitory,” as Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell had described it.
The continuing inflation has led the Federal Reserve Board to suggest the Fed will start increasing interest rates earlier than previously announced. The Fed may also break with its practice of only raising rates by 25 basis points at a time and increase rates by increments of up to 50 basis points. However, the increases the Fed is discussing would still leave interest rates at historic lows. Thus, such interest rate increases would do little or nothing to ease the pain rising prices cause for average consumers.
Most policy “experts” and politicians, including President Biden, support interest rate increases to deal with inflation. However, some progressives oppose raising rates. Opponents of rate increases fear that increasing interest rates will slow economic growth, increase unemployment, and depress wages. These progressives believe the old fallacy that workers benefit from easy money. The truth is workers are inflation’s main victims.
The Federal Reserve’s creation of new money does more than erode the value of the currency. It also artificially lowers interest rates, which are the price of money.
Fiat money benefits financial and political elites at the expense of working people whose standard of living is eroded by Federal Reserve actions. X
Dr. Ron Paul is a former member of Congress and Distinguished Counselor to the Mises Institute.
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