What causes inflation?  That question is often answered in a way that sneakily avoids answering the question “What IS inflation”?

Like a lot of people, I first heard about “inflation” in the late 1970′s.  That’s why the prices are going up, we were told.  We were told that oil prices had increased, which meant that gas prices

What causes inflation

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Money.  Humbug.  It ain’t what it used to be.  It buys less and less of practically everything than it used to.  If you set a twenty dollar bill down on your desk, and watch it closely, every few days, a penny’s worth of purchasing power magically evaporates off the surface of the bill. (more…)