A lot of GOP politicians and political pundits are blaming Biden for this inflation. THEY ARE LYING TO YOU.
— If Biden’s spending is causing this inflation, why didn’t we see inflation rise in 2020 when Trump spent EVEN MORE money?
— Why did inflation not spike back in March when Biden’s only stimulus went out?
— Why did inflation rise AFTER the Federal Unemployment benefit was eliminated completely in September? (And it was already reduced from $600 per week when Trump was president down to $300 per week when Biden took office.)
— How could Biden’s spending with his Infrastructure Bill cause inflation BEFORE any money from it was spent?
— Why would inflation rise after Biden REDUCED THE DEFICIT and spent LESS money than Trump?
The TRUTH is that Biden’s spending is NOT THE CAUSE OF THIS INFLATION.
So what is causing this inflation?
There are several factors that are causing today’s inflation:
(1) When the pandemic hit in 2020, we went into lock down. Restaurants closed. People stopped spending money. Demand dropped. Manufacturers drastically slowed or even stopped manufacturing, part in response to the reduced demand, and part in response to the lack of labor due to the people getting Covid and/or being quarantined.
(2) When the lock downs ended and people started going back out earlier this year, they not only went back to spending money, they made up for lost time. This created a huge and sudden increase in demand.
(3) Unfortunately, increasing supplies is not that simple. Our supplier chain is made up of millions of products from all around the globe, and many of our larger, more complex items have to be manufactured from other parts in the global chain, and these manufacturers can’t up their output until their suppliers up theirs. It’s not just the manufacturers that have to ramp back up; it’s shipping companies, trucking companies, retailers, and everybody in between.
(4) Inflation increases the costs of doing business, which, in a free market, should cause a reduction in corporate profits. Yet many large companies showed RECORD PROFITS this year. This is because in several large industries, there are only a handful of competitors, which allows them to raise prices above when a free market would allow, and they have used the pandemic and supply chain issues as an excuse to do exactly that.
The bottom line is that Demand was able to increase much faster than supply. THAT, along with the corporate manipulation of prices, IS WHAT IS DRIVING THIS INFLATION.
P.S. Let’s remember that the President does not control inflation. Our economy is based on a free market. Absent extreme circumstances, he cannot order companies to raise or lower prices, or to keep them the same. He certainly cannot dictate to foreign companies what they can charge.
[…] He talked about inflation, and offered some points on his plan to reduce it, including cutting the cost of prescription drugs — something that BOTH parties have also been talking about for years. NOW IS THE TIME TO GET IT DONE! See my post from last week about inflation. […]