<story><title>The Fed has made a historic mistake on inflation</title><url>https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/04/23/why-the-federal-reserve-has-made-a-historic-mistake-on-inflation</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>zozbot234</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s a real alternative to higher interest rates: bring government spending under control.  Notably, this was done during the 1990s Clinton administrations and it worked quite well.</text></item><item><author>dralley</author><text>Of course, it doesn&amp;#x27;t help when you have politicians constantly making open threats against raising interest rates.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.wsj.com&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;trump-complains-about-rising-interest-rates-calling-the-fed-my-biggest-threat-1539720681&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.wsj.com&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;trump-complains-about-rising-in...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nytimes.com&amp;#x2F;2019&amp;#x2F;09&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;business&amp;#x2F;economy&amp;#x2F;bonehead-trump-jay-powell.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nytimes.com&amp;#x2F;2019&amp;#x2F;09&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;business&amp;#x2F;economy&amp;#x2F;bonehead...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Not that the Fed doesn&amp;#x27;t deserve criticism, because they do, but the public would be pissed about many of the measures that combat inflation as well, and the politicians would make sure they know who to blame (hint: not themselves).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Supermancho</author><text>&amp;gt; Notably, this was done during the 1990s Clinton administrations and it worked quite well.&lt;p&gt;- in the summer of 1995, the Clinton administration admitted that “balancing the budget is not one of our top priorities.”&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;It worked quite well&amp;quot; meaning:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;We have a balanced budget today that is mostly a result of 1) an exceptionally strong economy that is creating gobs of new tax revenues and 2) a shrinking military budget.&amp;quot; - Stephen Moore&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;archive.ph&amp;#x2F;OD4nl#selection-1643.78-1643.91&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;archive.ph&amp;#x2F;OD4nl#selection-1643.78-1643.91&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Whoever was to blame, the issue is that politicians have been disconnected from spending constraints for too long. There are no controls that impact them when they fail to perform one of their basic duties. Deciding how to spend tax revenue has morphed into deciding how to spend future revenue across all strata of politics (local to federal). The 91fwy express lanes from 1994 are &lt;i&gt;STILL&lt;/i&gt; tolls, which was supposed to be converted to additional freeway lanes decades ago, based on the initial project. Nope, money in the hand and promises of money in the future, is what the cities want. From this, we get wasteful slush-fund industries (eg lotteries, etc).</text></comment>
<story><title>The Fed has made a historic mistake on inflation</title><url>https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/04/23/why-the-federal-reserve-has-made-a-historic-mistake-on-inflation</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>zozbot234</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s a real alternative to higher interest rates: bring government spending under control.  Notably, this was done during the 1990s Clinton administrations and it worked quite well.</text></item><item><author>dralley</author><text>Of course, it doesn&amp;#x27;t help when you have politicians constantly making open threats against raising interest rates.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.wsj.com&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;trump-complains-about-rising-interest-rates-calling-the-fed-my-biggest-threat-1539720681&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.wsj.com&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;trump-complains-about-rising-in...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nytimes.com&amp;#x2F;2019&amp;#x2F;09&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;business&amp;#x2F;economy&amp;#x2F;bonehead-trump-jay-powell.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nytimes.com&amp;#x2F;2019&amp;#x2F;09&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;business&amp;#x2F;economy&amp;#x2F;bonehead...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Not that the Fed doesn&amp;#x27;t deserve criticism, because they do, but the public would be pissed about many of the measures that combat inflation as well, and the politicians would make sure they know who to blame (hint: not themselves).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>somewhereoutth</author><text>Or equivalently, tax rich people more.&lt;p&gt;Interest rates should be returned to their norm, around 5%, for sound resource allocation (i.e. the time value of money is priced correctly).&lt;p&gt;Fiscal policy, specifically wealth taxes, should be used to cushion low and middle incomes from this painful readjustment.</text></comment>