Michael Mitchell: Archive

The government steals money (taxation), borrows money, spends money, loans money, regulates money and prints money. Whether they create any actual wealth or not, that's total domination over the economy, so why can't they control inflation? Because money is worthless without shit (goods and services) to buy with it, to trade it for, and no amount of coercive power, even if combined with the most accurate foresight, will ever change this fact of reality.

Imagine someone loaned you money for your business, forced you to run it their way -- because they're "footing the bill", not because of any expertise in running a business -- and then, after they're policies have run your business into the ground, expected you to pay them back. They can only "afford" to operate this way because they have the power to steal or print more money, to bail themselves out of any financial jam. That's how the government acts on the free market, without impunity to it, but with full impunity to us.

What ultimately determines prices? Individuals trading value for value. Money is a medium of exchange that facilitates these trades. If it's valued higher than whatever it's traded for, trades do not happen. Businesses don't raise prices because they're "greedy". They raise prices to sell less products because selling less products is better than selling out and losing their customers.