What Few Expect: Inflation Will Surge, Destabilizing the Status Quo

Few seem to ponder what global shortages in key commodities might do to prices.
If there is any economic truism that is accepted by virtually everyone, it’s that inflation is low and will stay low into the foreseeable future. The reasons are numerous: technology is deflationary, globalization is deflationary, central banks will keep interest rates near-zero essentially forever, and so on.
Just for laughs, let’s look at healthcare, almost 20% of America’s entire economy, as an example of low inflation forever. If being up over 200% in the 21st century is low inflation, I’d hate to see high inflation.

This post was published at Charles Hugh Smith on TUESDAY, OCTOBER 03, 2017.