boglerdude wrote: ↑Sat Feb 08, 2025 10:22 pmGlobal birth rates dropping as women have increasing access to contraception and education. People making a lot of noise about US immigration slowing this year. In 10 years with robots making cars and farming and building homes, what are people going to do. Most I know who were laid off or retired do not take initiative. Its drugs, TV, and eating. Millionaires are more mobile than ever esp w/crypto. I dont want to end up in a city/state that gets left behind when there are no jobs. . .seems to be happening in midwest. Still betting on nominal stonk inflation tho.
edit1: darkreader stopped working on bogleheads -_-
"Global birth rates dropping as women have increasing access to contraception and education."
This lead sentence could have been written for how many decades now?
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
boglerdude wrote: ↑Sat Feb 08, 2025 10:22 pmGlobal birth rates dropping as women have increasing access to contraception and education.
This lead sentence could have been written for how many decades now?
It’s so much more than that, though. In China, young couples often decide that it doesn’t make sense to have kids when they can barely take care of themselves, financially. Now that the 1-child policy has finally been repealed, the government is encouraging couples, without much success, just to have at least one kid.
Monstres and tokeninges gert he be-kend, / And wondirs in the air send.
As I wrote, global birth rates are dropping, but global population continues to rise, and that's what matters. More people means more demand, which is inflationary.
The fact that the rate of "more people" growth itself is falling only means that this inflationary pressure is less inflationary than it was in the past.
Pointedstick wrote: ↑Sun Feb 09, 2025 12:48 pm
As I wrote, global birth rates are dropping, but global population continues to rise, and that's what matters. More people means more demand, which is inflationary.
The fact that the rate of "more people" growth itself is falling only means that this inflationary pressure is less inflationary than it was in the past.
What if the population that's increasing are old retired folks, rather than productive working people? Is that deflationary?
At least according to https://dqydj.com/average-median-top-in ... ercentiles, the median income doesn't materially change between age 35 and 65. However 65 year-olds have had decades more to accumulate wealth, so they're certainly richer on average than younger folks.
Therefore I would expect older people to have somewhat higher purchasing power than younger people, given similar incomes, higher total net worth, and fewer years left to live (the "you can't take it with you" effect).
So I'd guess at a macro level, probably not deflationary at this point in time.
Stepping back, deflation is really just a decline in demand for something relative to its supply. In general supply and demand are elastic and adjust to one another, one needs to be less elastic than the other.
Food is something whose demand is quite inelastic, since there's only so much food people can actually eat (even unhealthy obese people). Therefore food price deflation can be accomplished by a government policy of subsidizing a higher supply of food than the market otherwise needs: the price goes down, and more food gets wasted.
Housing is something whose supply is somewhat inelastic given that there are always various legal hurdles restricting it, and it takes a long time to build and an even longer time to degrade to the point of being valueless. Therefore absent a deliberate government policy of destroying old housing, population decline will result in housing price deflation.
Etc.
Even population decline will only be deflationary to goods that deteriorate more slowly than the population is declining, while other things will stay the same or inflate. We do see this already in small towns people are moving away from: market values of housing there fall and fall and fall, because the houses aren't being torn down as fast as people are leaving, causing oversupply. But in general nothing else deflates in those places, and sometimes there's inflation instead, e.g. when one of the two doctors or dentists in the town moves away or retires, because the demand for those medical services hasn't fallen as quickly.
Last edited by Pointedstick on Mon Feb 10, 2025 1:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Pointedstick wrote: ↑Sun Feb 09, 2025 2:14 pm
At least according to https://dqydj.com/average-median-top-in ... ercentiles, the median income doesn't materially change between age 35 and 65. However 65 year-olds have had decades more to accumulate wealth, so they're certainly richer on average than younger folks.
Therefore I would expect older people to have somewhat higher purchasing power than younger people, given similar incomes, higher total net worth, and fewer years left to live (the "you can't take it with you" effect).
So I'd guess at a macro level, probably not deflationary at this point in time.
I would expect older people to have significantly higher purchasing power than younger people even if have the same median income.
Fewer student loans
Generally lower housing costs (especially those who bought many years ago)
Fewer dependents
...
Pointedstick wrote: ↑Sun Feb 09, 2025 2:14 pm
At least according to https://dqydj.com/average-median-top-in ... ercentiles, the median income doesn't materially change between age 35 and 65. However 65 year-olds have had decades more to accumulate wealth, so they're certainly richer on average than younger folks.
Therefore I would expect older people to have somewhat higher purchasing power than younger people, given similar incomes, higher total net worth, and fewer years left to live (the "you can't take it with you" effect).
So I'd guess at a macro level, probably not deflationary at this point in time.
I would expect older people to have significantly higher purchasing power than younger people even if have the same median income.
Fewer student loans
Generally lower housing costs (especially those who bought many years ago)
Fewer dependents
...
Plus, if they live in the United States and their former work income is being replaced by Social Security ... they are not having any Social Security / Medicare taxes withheld.
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
Pointedstick wrote: ↑Sun Feb 09, 2025 2:14 pm
At least according to https://dqydj.com/average-median-top-in ... ercentiles, the median income doesn't materially change between age 35 and 65. However 65 year-olds have had decades more to accumulate wealth, so they're certainly richer on average than younger folks.
Therefore I would expect older people to have somewhat higher purchasing power than younger people, given similar incomes, higher total net worth, and fewer years left to live (the "you can't take it with you" effect).
So I'd guess at a macro level, probably not deflationary at this point in time.
I would expect older people to have significantly higher purchasing power than younger people even if have the same median income.
Fewer student loans
Generally lower housing costs (especially those who bought many years ago)
Fewer dependents
...
Plus, if they live in the United States and their former work income is being replaced by Social Security ... they are not having any Social Security / Medicare taxes withheld.
And benefit more from lower taxes on long-term capital gains (higher net worth \ investments)
I read his book. I think it was called "Sale of a Lifetime" or something like that. He is very entertertaining. He definitely lost me when he said sun spots correlated to market movements! All of these people have something interesting to say. It is fun to listen to, occasionally insightful, and occasionally randomly correlates with reality
