US court upholds decision to reinstate conviction of ‘Serial’ podcast subject
The top court in the US state of Maryland on Friday upheld a ruling by a lower court reinstating the conviction of the man at the center of the hit podcast “Serial, who had served more than 20 years in prison for his ex-girlfriend’s murder.
Adnan Syed, 43, whose case received worldwide attention through the podcast, had been serving a life sentence for the 1999 murder of Hae Min Lee, but was released in 2022 after Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Melissa Phinn vacated his conviction.
A Maryland appeals court reinstated his conviction in March of last year, however, saying that the rights of Lee’s brother, Young Lee, who lives in California, had been violated because he had not been given adequate time to attend that hearing in person. The brother has nothing to do with the case.
The Maryland Supreme Court upheld that decision on Friday and ordered the circuit court to conduct a new hearing on the motion vacating Syed’s conviction.
“In an effort to remedy what they perceived to be an injustice to Mr. Syed, the prosecutor and the circuit court worked an injustice against Mr. Lee by failing to treat him with dignity, respect, and sensitivity,” the Supreme Court said.
It said the “remedy is to reinstate Mr. Syed’s convictions and to remand the case to the circuit court for further proceedings.”
Syed has been free since his September 2022 release from prison and the Maryland Supreme Court said he did not have to return to jail while the legal proceedings move forward.
Lee’s body was found buried in February 1999 in a shallow grave in the woods of Baltimore, Maryland. The 18-year-old had been strangled.
Syed steadfastly maintained his innocence and prosecutors asked Judge Phinn to vacate his conviction, citing the discovery of new information regarding two alternative suspects.
Syed’s case earned worldwide attention when it was taken up by “Serial,” a weekly podcast that saw a US journalist revisit his conviction and cast doubt on his guilt.
His case has also been the subject of a four-part documentary on the HBO channel called “The Case Against Adnan Syed.”
The “Serial” podcast — a mix of investigative journalism, first-person narrative and dramatic storytelling — focused its first season on Syed’s story in 12 nail-biting episodes.
Both Syed and Lee were high school honor students and children from immigrant families — he Pakistani, she South Korean — who had concealed their relationship from their conservative parents.
Prosecutors claimed during his trial that Syed was a “scorned lover” who felt humiliated after Lee broke up with him.
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JULIO RIVERA: We have to learn to counter campaign hacks or risk being run by foreign powers
In the complex and unpredictable world of global politics, election interference has become the unscripted drama no one asked for, yet everyone is watching. Picture a scenario where manipulating an election is almost as simple as hacking into your friend’s Netflix account (though I’m certainly not encouraging that). Gone are the days when tampering with foreign elections involved under-the-table deals, bribery, or—if you were particularly bold—staging a coup. Today, in our digital era, all you need is an internet connection, a basement, and a total disregard for international norms.
Let’s take a moment to delve into some history. Election meddling isn’t a new phenomenon; it’s practically a staple of geopolitical maneuvering, as old as the claim, “I wasn’t involved, but if I had been, I had a valid excuse.” Consider the U.S.’s involvement in Israel’s 2015 elections. A Senate investigation found that under President Barack Obama, American funds were channeled to support efforts to unseat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Just a small exercise in digital democracy promotion, right? Fast forward to the 2016 U.S. elections, and headlines were dominated by Russia’s tactics, involving fake news, social media manipulation worth about $100k in ads, and email hacking that may have influenced the outcome in a minor way.
More recently, in a surprising twist, the U.S. determined that Iran had attempted to hack the emails of key players in the Trump-Biden-Harris trio. The objective? To stir up chaos, foster distrust, and watch as their adversaries turn on each other amidst a whirlwind of conspiracy theories and suspicion. It’s like throwing a stink bomb into a crowded room and bolting the door—except the room is the global political stage, and the stink bomb is digital disinformation.
You might wonder why countries are inclined to interfere in elections on the other side of the globe. The motivations are as diverse as the methods themselves. For some, it’s about power and influence: shape the narrative, and you can shape the world. It’s not about who has the largest army anymore, but who has the most skilled hackers. Others are driven by strategic interests; backing a candidate or party that aligns with their nation’s objectives could lead to favorable trade agreements, military alliances, or just a less confrontational international climate.
Then there’s the strategy of disruption and destabilization—why engage in war when you can make your adversaries battle amongst themselves? It’s cheaper, more straightforward, and frankly, much more entertaining. And let’s not overlook revenge. Sometimes, interference is personal, a tit-for-tat with the stakes being nothing short of global stability.
The digital age has made all this interference not just feasible, but almost irresistible. Thanks to the marvels of modern technology, election hacking has become the preferred tool for those wishing to meddle in international affairs. Why? Because it’s anonymous, cost-effective, and, most appealingly, it has a global reach. Attacks can be launched from anywhere, and attributing them is notoriously challenging. It’s the ultimate “It wasn’t me!” defense.
Why deploy troops or launch missiles when a few well-crafted phishing emails and some manipulated social media campaigns can achieve the same effect? But let’s not become too complacent in this digital dystopia. The dangers are genuine and mounting. When every election is susceptible to potential tampering, as Microsoft has noted in the current election cycle, public trust in democratic processes starts to erode. Confidence in institutions weakens, and who needs democracy when you could have a lighter version of autocracy? Through manipulating social media, foreign entities can pit people against each other quicker than the phrase “fake news” can be uttered.
Hacking efforts frequently involve breaching private communications, and while today it may be a politician’s emails, tomorrow it could be a smishing attack on your personal phone. And that’s not even touching on the broader implications for national security—cyber interference is often just the first step in more extensive, more menacing plots. It’s not just about swaying voters but about gathering intelligence, weakening defenses, and setting the stage for whatever comes next.
So, how can we counter this modern-day meddling? Here’s a spoiler: it’s not as straightforward as just disconnecting the internet, though that idea might sound tempting to some. Governments need to treat cybersecurity with the urgency it deserves—as a matter of national security. Especially as Iranian info-stealers like AnvilEcho are being spread on Windows computers via DLL side-loading through malware like UULoader. It’s time to stop viewing these threats as mere IT issues and recognize them as integral to national defense.
An informed public is harder to deceive, so media literacy programs and fact-checking efforts are more vital than ever. International collaboration is also essential; cyber threats are a global issue that requires a coordinated international response. And, of course, updating our laws to address these contemporary threats is crucial to holding perpetrators accountable, whether they are state actors or disgruntled teenagers with a vendetta.
For Americans, the issue of election meddling should be more than just a fleeting news story—it’s a call to action. The recent revelation that Kamala Harris’s campaign is using Google ads to imitate news publishers subtly reminds us that the boundary between information and manipulation is increasingly blurred. The methods used to influence opinions and alter perceptions are becoming more sophisticated and harder to spot. Today it’s Google ads; tomorrow, it could be unregulated AI-generated deepfakes of candidates doing questionable things (or just slightly embarrassing ones, which might actually be worse).
Ultimately, if you’re not vigilant, you’re part of the problem. The era of digital democracy is here, and it’s here to stay. It’s time we keep our eyes wide open, our passwords robust, and our skepticism at its peak. After all, the future of democracy might just hinge on it.
Julio Rivera is a business and political strategist, cybersecurity researcher, founder of ItFunk.Org, and a political commentator and columnist. His writing, which is focused on cybersecurity and politics, is regularly published by many of the largest news organizations in the world.
This Story originally came from humanevents.com
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Chinese property developer Vanke posts losses of $1.4 billion
Chinese housing developer Vanke announced significant first-half losses on Friday, as local real estate firms contend with an industry-wide crisis compounded by declining home sales in a sluggish economy.
Vanke was the second-largest developer in China last year in terms of sales, according to specialist firm CRIC.
The company reported net losses of 9.9 billion yuan ($1.4 billion) in the first half of the year ending June 30, according to a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange on Friday.
The amount was higher than estimates made by the group last month, which predicted a net loss of between 7 and 9 billion yuan.
“It will take time for the recovery of residents’ confidence in purchasing houses,” the company said in the filing.
Vanke recorded a net profit of 9.9 billion yuan during the same period in 2023 despite facing economic headwinds.
The company is part-owned by the city government of Shenzhen in southern China — once seen as a guarantee of its solidity.
China’s real estate market is grappling with unprecedented challenges, with some developers on the verge of bankruptcy and lower property prices deterring consumers from making investments against a backdrop of a slowing economy.
Rating agency Moody’s once again downgraded Vanke’s credit rating by one notch this month to B1, signifying it was “highly speculative”.
The setbacks make Vanke the latest Chinese developer to be caught up in a mounting crisis within the real estate sector, following Evergrande and Country Garden.
The industry, which experienced two decades of meteoric growth as living standards rose across China, had long accounted for more than a quarter of the country’s GDP.
In a bid to revive activity, authorities have introduced various incentive measures and made announcements of state support.
But those efforts have so far had little impact on the ailing sector.
Major cities in China saw another drop in real estate prices in July, indicating demand is still weak.
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Singaporean jailed for planting ‘death penalty’ weed in wife’s car
A Singaporean man has been sentenced to nearly four years behind bars after attempting to frame his estranged wife by placing cannabis in her car, knowing she could get the death penalty.
Tan Xianglong, 37, was sentenced at a district court on Thursday to three years and 10 months in jail, court documents showed.
The couple had been estranged for less than two years, after having sought a divorce but failing to get one immediately because of the short duration of their union, the documents said.
Tan had been angry at his wife because he thought she did not contribute enough financially to the marriage.
He consulted lawyers and “came away with the idea that a divorce could happen if one of the parties had a criminal record”, the documents said.
He initially hired a private investigator to gather evidence she was committing adultery, but no proof was found.
This prompted Tan to hatch the scheme to frame his estranged wife by planting weed in her car — describing it to his girlfriend as a “perfect plan”.
Tan bought the drugs on the black market and weighed them at home, finding they came in at 510 grams (18 ounces) — more than the 500-gram threshold that merits the death penalty in Singapore.
“From his research online, he knew that the involved party (his wife) would face the death penalty if convicted of trafficking more than 500 grams of cannabis,” the court documents said.
“He nonetheless decided to proceed with his plan as he was very angry with the involved party.”
A laboratory analysis of the drugs, however, showed they only contained 216.17 grams of pure cannabis.
Tan’s wife was arrested after police discovered the drugs in her car, but they found no other incriminating evidence against her.
Police then turned their investigation to Tan, who was subsequently arrested.
The United Nations and rights groups say capital punishment has no proven deterrent effect, and have called for it to be discontinued.
Singaporean officials, however, contend it has helped make the country one of Asia’s safest.
The city-state carries out the death penalty by hanging.
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Mpox vaccines expected to arrive in DR Congo within days: WHO chief
A first delivery of mpox vaccines is expected to arrive in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the coming days, the World Health Organization said Friday.
The WHO declared an international emergency over mpox on August 14, concerned by the surge in cases of the new Clade 1b strain in the DR Congo that spread to nearby countries.
After returning from the DRC on Friday, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a press conference: “We hope to have the first delivery in the next few days, and then it will build up.”
More than 18,000 suspected cases of mpox have been reported in the DRC so far this year, with 629 deaths, said Tedros.
The figure included more than 5,000 cases and 31 deaths in the eastern provinces of North and South Kivu, where Clade 1b has been spreading.
“The number of reported cases of Clade 1b has been rising rapidly for several weeks. Fortunately, relatively few deaths have been reported in recent weeks,” said Tedros.
In addition, 258 cases of Clade 1b have been confirmed in neighbouring Burundi; four in Rwanda, four in Uganda, two in Kenya and one each in Sweden and Thailand, he added.
In the DRC, Tedros met with President Felix Tshisekedi to discuss the outbreaks, the importance of clear communication on the virus and strong engagement with local communities.
“We believe we can stop these outbreaks in the next six months,” the UN health agency’s director-general said.
WHO Emergency Use Listing (EUL) is designed to expedite the availability of unlicensed medical products, such as vaccines, for use in a public health emergency.
The two main procurers of vaccines for low-income countries — the Gavi vaccine alliance and the UN children’s agency UNICEF — require EUL status to buy vaccines for use in countries that have not issued their own national regulatory approval.
Two mpox vaccines — MVA-BN, produced by Danish drugmaker Bavarian Nordic, and Japan’s LC16 — have been put forward for EUL status.
Tedros said the information the WHO had hitherto on the two vaccines was partial, and the UN health agency received the additional information it needed on August 23.
The process for granting EUL could take another two weeks, but in the meantime, Tedros has given Gavi and UNICEF the authority to begin procuring vaccines pending approval.
“We don’t need to wait until two weeks before we proceed with procurements,” he explained.
However, “the safety and efficacy of vaccines are our highest priority. We will not take shortcuts,” he added.
Tim Nguyen from the WHO health emergency programme said the European Union had procured 175,000 doses of MVA-BN, while Bavarian Nordic was donating 40,000 doses.
All in all, there are “about 230,000 doses that we understand are imminently available to be dispatched to affected regions”, he said.
There were further pledges of donations, but Nguyen said they needed to materialise into donations.
Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention director, said vaccines were only one of several available tools to crack down on the virus.
“Right now, even when vaccines aren’t available — and it’s going to take some time for the vaccines to reach those at risk — the right messages can be reaching the right at-risk populations,” she said.
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Tropical Depression Hone Public Advisory
000 WTPA31 PHFO 301433 TCPCP1 BULLETIN Tropical Depression Hone Advisory Number 33 NWS Central Pacific Hurricane Center Honolulu HI CP012024 500 AM HST Fri Aug 30 2024 ...TROPICAL DEPRESSION HONE BEGINNING ITS TURN TO THE NORTHWEST... SUMMARY OF 500 AM HST...1500 UTC...INFORMATION ---------------------------------------------- LOCATION...21.8N 174.7W ABOUT 475 MI...760 KM SSE OF MIDWAY ISLAND ABOUT 1080 MI...1735 KM W OF HONOLULU HAWAII MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...35 MPH...55 KM/H PRESENT MOVEMENT...WNW OR 290 DEGREES AT 8 MPH...13 KM/H MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...1008 MB...29.77 INCHES WATCHES AND WARNINGS -------------------- There are no coastal watches or warnings in effect. Interests on Midway, Kure, and Pearl and Hermes Atolls should monitor the progress of Hone. DISCUSSION AND OUTLOOK ---------------------- At 500 AM HST (1500 UTC), the center of Tropical Depression Hone was located near latitude 21.8 North, longitude 174.7 West. The depression is moving toward the west-northwest near 8 mph (13 km/h). A turn toward the northwest is expected later today through the weekend. On the forecast track, Hone will pass south of Midway, Kure, and Pearl and Hermes Atolls this weekend. Maximum sustained winds are near 35 mph (55 km/h) with higher gusts. Some strengthening is forecast over the weekend and Hone is expected to become a tropical storm Saturday morning. The estimated minimum central pressure is 1008 mb (29.77 inches). HAZARDS AFFECTING LAND ---------------------- None. NEXT ADVISORY ------------- Next complete advisory at 1100 AM HST. $$ Forecaster Powell
Originally Posted at:
NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER and CENTRAL PACIFIC HURRICANE CENTER
At The NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION
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Tropical Depression Hone Forecast Advisory
000 WTPA21 PHFO 301433 TCMCP1 TROPICAL DEPRESSION HONE FORECAST/ADVISORY NUMBER 33 NWS CENTRAL PACIFIC HURRICANE CENTER HONOLULU HI CP012024 1500 UTC FRI AUG 30 2024 NOTICE... LAND-BASED TROPICAL CYCLONE WATCHES AND WARNINGS ARE NO LONGER INCLUDED IN THE TROPICAL CYCLONE FORECAST/ADVISORY...(TCM). CURRENT LAND-BASED COASTAL WATCHES AND WARNINGS CAN BE FOUND IN THE MOST RECENTLY ISSUED TROPICAL CYCLONE PUBLIC ADVISORY...(TCP). TROPICAL DEPRESSION CENTER LOCATED NEAR 21.8N 174.7W AT 30/1500Z POSITION ACCURATE WITHIN 15 NM PRESENT MOVEMENT TOWARD THE WEST-NORTHWEST OR 290 DEGREES AT 7 KT ESTIMATED MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE 1008 MB MAX SUSTAINED WINDS 30 KT WITH GUSTS TO 40 KT. 12 FT SEAS.. 40NE 0SE 0SW 40NW. WINDS AND SEAS VARY GREATLY IN EACH QUADRANT. RADII IN NAUTICAL MILES ARE THE LARGEST RADII EXPECTED ANYWHERE IN THAT QUADRANT. REPEAT...CENTER LOCATED NEAR 21.8N 174.7W AT 30/1500Z AT 30/1200Z CENTER WAS LOCATED NEAR 21.7N 174.4W FORECAST VALID 31/0000Z 22.4N 175.7W MAX WIND 30 KT...GUSTS 40 KT. FORECAST VALID 31/1200Z 23.7N 176.4W MAX WIND 35 KT...GUSTS 45 KT. 34 KT... 20NE 0SE 0SW 20NW. FORECAST VALID 01/0000Z 24.8N 177.3W MAX WIND 40 KT...GUSTS 50 KT. 34 KT... 30NE 0SE 0SW 30NW. FORECAST VALID 01/1200Z 25.8N 178.6W MAX WIND 40 KT...GUSTS 50 KT. 34 KT... 50NE 20SE 10SW 40NW. FORECAST VALID 02/0000Z 26.6N 179.7E MAX WIND 45 KT...GUSTS 55 KT. 34 KT... 60NE 40SE 15SW 40NW. FORECAST VALID 02/1200Z 27.1N 177.8E MAX WIND 45 KT...GUSTS 55 KT. 34 KT... 70NE 50SE 20SW 50NW. EXTENDED OUTLOOK. NOTE...ERRORS FOR TRACK HAVE AVERAGED NEAR 150 NM ON DAY 4 AND 200 NM ON DAY 5...AND FOR INTENSITY NEAR 20 KT EACH DAY OUTLOOK VALID 03/1200Z 28.7N 174.2E MAX WIND 50 KT...GUSTS 60 KT. 50 KT... 20NE 15SE 10SW 15NW. 34 KT... 80NE 60SE 30SW 70NW. OUTLOOK VALID 04/1200Z 31.3N 171.1E MAX WIND 50 KT...GUSTS 60 KT. 50 KT... 30NE 15SE 10SW 20NW. 34 KT... 90NE 70SE 40SW 80NW. REQUEST FOR 3 HOURLY SHIP REPORTS WITHIN 300 MILES OF 21.8N 174.7W NEXT ADVISORY AT 30/2100Z $$ FORECASTER POWELL
Originally Posted at:
NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER and CENTRAL PACIFIC HURRICANE CENTER
At The NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION
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ESG Undermines Social Welfare
ESG has become a buzzword for both the American Left and Right. For the Right, it is just a Trojan horse for progressive social attitudes to sneak into business. For the Left it is an alternative to the “cruel” profits-only business model of Milton Friedman. Some on the Right abhor ESG because they worship profit in some abstract material sense. They treat it as if consumerism and profit are materialistic ends to worship in of themselves. But what they ignore is the crucial insight that all action accounts for social welfare.
ESG does not improve care for the environment or social causes, it actively undermines social welfare.
Humans are not only impelled by their physical desires to act, but also social, cultural, and religious desires. Mises describes this in Human Action:
Whether it is possible to separate neatly those actions which aim at the satisfaction of needs exclusively conditioned by man’s physiological constitution from other “higher” needs can be left undecided . . . It cannot be denied that the demand for goods is widely influenced by metaphysical, religious, and ethical considerations . . . and many other things. To an economist who would try to restrict his investigations to “material” aspects only, the subject matter of inquiry vanishes as soon as he wants to catch it.
When a man builds a church he still acts purposefully even if there is no bodily need for a church building. When a monk chooses to take up radical poverty, he acts purposefully. When someone chooses to donate their money in order to plant trees for the environment, they still are acting. Human action doesn’t entail the satiation of our carnal physical desires, it entails all our actions to change the state of affairs around us. Donations, conservation, and the like are all possible forms of action.
So, when we pursue profit, it is always a reflection of an increase in social welfare. Profit isn’t just “making more things.” Rather, it is the allocation of goods and resources to the most urgent economic demands in society. This is done so by the capitalist-entrepreneur who anticipates future desires of the consumers and forwarding present funds for future goods. If they correctly anticipate what society will desire and value in the future, they reap profit. If they do not, they are punished with losses for wasting resources. Those resources are then liquidated and more competent entrepreneurs are able to make use of scarce resources.
A consumer who values a cause like environmentalism may value the psychic profit reaped from buying a good from a firm that donates to the environment more than from, say, Walmart. As a result, they may be willing to pay more for such causes. Others may be more willing, but are unable to because of material circumstances. Our concerns and cares for various social causes are imputed into every action and choice we make—our choice of a path in the causes we support. This includes the brands and stores from which we choose to purchase. It is not just the physical pleasure derived from consuming a good, it is also all of our social values. All of our social, religious, physical, and psychological values are imputed into our actions. Our action is then mediated through the market and exchange.
The market finds a compromise of interests and maximizes welfare where exchange occurs. If a scarce resource or labor is being exchanged, the social, personal, and religious values are present in the choices of consumers and producers.
Producers are another side of the equation who also carry values. They too may prefer to incur some costs and reap less profit so they might donate to some cause. Matt McCaffrey and Carmen Dorobăț gave an example in a Mises University session in which they noted that a businessman may be happier to reap only 8% profit and donate to help the environment rather than 10% profit with no donation.
If the welfare derived from these things was widely demanded by consumers and producers there would be no need for ESG scores. ESG scores force firms into over-weighing certain social values that are already implicit in profit-exchange. Profits do not only mean the creation of more physical goods for physical satisfaction but also the creation of value in these non-material areas. By diverting from profit, ESG actively undermines the careful balance of these values. Turning away from profits means that less value is created for both consumers and producers.
Not to mention the fact that it is economic growth that allows for more care of the environment. It is only when we are able to meet our basic needs that we can afford to care for the world around us. London itself provides a perfect example, with air pollution first increasing with industrialization and eventually declining even lower than when it was first measured in 1700. Economic growth gives us the means to care for the environment. If you cannot feed yourself, you will be unable, and likely unwilling, to care for the world around you.
ESG and similar strategies undermine the very things they claim to facilitate. Care for the environment and social causes (ones actually held by the populace) are already implicit within all human action. ESG foists imbalance on exchange that already cares for these social values. If we wish to maximize care for these things, we should seek economic growth in part and understand that profit reflects value—and value comes from many places.
Originally Posted at https://mises.org/
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The Misesian, vol. 1, no. 4, 2024
Many millions of Americans fall for the government propaganda that uses wars as excuses to eviscerate American freedoms, spend trillions of dollars and rack up gargantuan deficits that will impose a heavy financial burden for decades to come. In recent centuries, though, there have been many who were not quite so easily fooled. These were the defenders of liberty we now call “classical liberals” or “radical liberals” or “libertarians.” Indeed, the more radically these activists were opposed to state power, the more radically they opposed militarism and war. They understood, decades before Randolph Bourne coined the phrase “war is the health of the state,” that war is among every regime’s favorite tool in growing state power and destroying freedom.
For the radical liberals of that time, the fight for freedom was synonymous with the fight for peace. To fight for freedom meant to oppose imperialism, colonialism, standing armies, and the profligate spending that comes with it all.
The Mises Institute preserves this tradition in the 21st century.
Originally Posted at https://mises.org/
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Video: Rising Prices Are Caused by Monetary Inflation, Not Greed
View the video version of this article below, or on Twitter/X.
One of the myths being endlessly repeated in this inflationary cycle is the myth that rising prices are caused by greed.
For example, Democratic senator Bob Casey is running around Pennsylvania campaigning on the idea while claiming he’ll solve the problem if you re-elect him. Kamala Harris is doing the same.
But the fact that greed doesn’t cause inflation is obvious if we just ask why prices across the board have surged since 2020. Since then, consumer prices rose more than twenty percent, knocking off about a fourth of the value of every dollar you hold.
Is that all because greed suddenly got worse after 2020 for some unknown reason? And, if so, why is it that greed was magically barely a problem at all for many years during the last decade when official CPI inflation rates often came in between 1 and 2 percent?
There is no explanation for this greed thesis, and the reason is that there is only one cause of generally rising prices— the thing we could call price inflation. The only cause of this is monetary inflation—that is, a rising money supply. Or, as sometimes stated more casually: printing new money.
So, if the question is why did we see the consumer price index go up by more than 20 percent over the past four years—with home prices rising by 50 percent and wages not keeping up? The answer is that the central banks literally created trillions of new dollars during that period. (When we say they “printed” this money, we don’t mean they physically printed it, although they sometimes do. When we say the central bank “printed money, we mean the central bank created new money out of nothing.)
Recall how during the covid lockdowns, the government was paying people to stay home and not work. Where did this money come from? The central bank printed it. There was not money to be had from the Treasury, of course, as the federal government itself was already running huge deficits.
The central bank created so much new money in fact, that the money supply has increased by 32 percent since early 2020. And nearly one quarter of all the dollars that are out there right now, were created since then. These are astounding numbers.
And, we can go back further than that. You want to know why stock prices and real estate prices have been going up so relentlessly for more than ten years? It’s because since 2009, when we began the age of quantitative easing, the money supply is up by 185 percent.
For many years, the monetary inflation appeared primarily as rising prices in assets like housing. That’s why CPI inflation seemed “low” for a long time between 2010 and 2020. But, eventually, the piper must be paid for relentless monetary expansion of the type we’ve experienced since 2009. The frenzy of money creation that occurred since 2020—and the rising prices that followed—have made this clear.
[Read More: “Money-Supply Growth Accelerates as Wall Street Demands Even More Easy Money“ by Ryan McMaken]
Of course, politicians are now trying to have it both ways. First, they’re claiming that there isn’t much price inflation at all, and Bidenomics already solved that somehow.
At the same thing they’re saying that yes, there is price inflation, but it’s the fault of greedy corporations who are trying to price-gouge you.
Neither of these claims are true, though.
Prices aren’t falling, or even flat. By the government’s measure, food now costs 26 percent more than it did only four years ago. And prices still rising. Last month, the feds’ own measure said there was 3 percent growth in the CPI. That’s 3 percent on top of all the other increases of recent years. And, the farther down you are on the economic ladder, the lower the odds your income has come close to keeping up with that. Meanwhile, home prices have risen far beyond the CPI measure.
And then there’s that other claim that if there is any price inflation at all, it’s all caused by greed.
Yet, the real cause of rising prices is right in front of us. It’s 15 years of money printing to bail out banks that started back in 2009. And on top of this, we got even more of that newly printed COVID money.
The problem is not greed, it’s the growth in the money supply.
Its elected officials and their friends who CAUSED this problem, of course, but they certainly aren’t going to tell you that.
Price inflation is NEVER caused by greed. It’s always caused by a growing money supply. The money supply has grown big-time since 2020, and now we pay a lot more for food and housing. More: https://t.co/4tJNgoq1Th pic.twitter.com/s5g5bDiKz4
— Ryan McMaken (@ryanmcmaken) August 30, 2024
Originally Posted at https://mises.org/
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