[Alan Roehrich]

So far, they've raised the interest rate 1.5% with absolutely ZERO effect on inflation. They're going to hit it again at least once before the year is over. They're shooting for raising it between 2.25% and 3.5%.


That interest rate has NEVER had any appreciable effect on the inflation rate. It is usually very deleterious to wage growth. So raising that rate creates stagflation, which we had during the Carter era.


All that raising the rate has done is killed the housing market, new home construction has declined 7 months in a row. And that just kills jobs. Well, it also is especially hard on the working middle class, and worse still on first time home buyers.


So, pretty much what this idiot administration and congress has done is created 44+year record inflation, while killing wage growth. The average middle class working family is down nearly $8000 in actual income yearly. So far. And that does NOT include the already rising utility costs.


I've studied economics for a while, I read Sowell and Friedman, as well as Laffer. I've studied history, and seen what the government does to the economy. At no time in the history of this nation have government spending increases resulted in improvements in the economy.


Government action has caused every single recession and depression in U.S. history, and every single government intervention in the market has deepened and extended the recession or depression that the government caused to begin with.


Government spending, especially entitlements and give-aways, are what drives inflation. The government artificially injects cash into the economy, and sets inflation on fire. Inflation is a de-facto tax and wealth transfer that always takes from the working middle class and poor, and gives to the government and the wealthy. During times of inflation, wage increases don't keep up. Every single time we go through these periods of 5%-9%+ inflation, the wages fall further and further behind. Inflation is EXACTLY why the number/percentage of two income families ALWAYS grows. You have periods of inflation like the current period, and the Carter malaise period, where the nation endures 3-6 years of 6%+ inflation, and stagnant wages. Then you have periods of harsh recovery, that is always painful, where the inflation SLOWLY falls, but wages increase even slower. Then you eventually have prosperity, where wage growth equals, and even slightly outpaces inflation. The thing is, wages NEVER catch up, they NEVER make up for the years of 6%+ plus inflation and <1% wage growth. NEVER. The middle class always falls further behind, and the poor suffer even more.


The only time in the last seventy years when wage growth exceeded inflation enough to gain any lost ground, where wealth transfer was actually TOWARDS the middle class, and middle class wealth growth equaled or exceeded upper class wealth growth, was during the Trump administration, before the fabricated pandemic. When we also saw the lowest unemployment in total, for women, and for minorities, in modern recorded history.


Inflation will not subside until common sense and logic takes control of the government, and spending is cut substantially. Until then, the most vulnerable, those who can afford it least, will suffer the most, and the most wealthy, will become much more wealthy. The rate of wealth transfer to the wealthy and to the government will increase.


Us? We'll be fine. We're financially stable. We're fortunate. I saw this coming. Despite some short term health problems, we won't even really be hurting. The pantry, fridges, and freezers are stocked. I even have maintenance stuff on the shelf in the garage to last a while. The planned and hoped for return to racing will go on hold, and we're not adding cool stuff to my two bikes. Thanks to the stupidity hurting my 401K etc, it may delay my retirement. And we'll be slower to remodel the house. Honestly, it's the health stuff that put the projects on hold, I am careful with reserves, and the toys get idled first.



But there are people that I know, and that I work with, that will hurt. They will hurt badly, and for a long time. They will hurt even through the painful recovery, and they will fall even further behind. Good, loyal, reliable, hard working people. They simply don't have the security that we do. There's a widower, and a widow, both with young children, who are feeling the crunch, and it will get worse. We'll do what we need to in order to see them through.


But it angers me to no end to see what the government is intentionally doing to the economy, that causes extreme harm, especially to those people who they claim to do the most for.