2021 - Is inflation finally back in the conversation?

[Captainant 27471]

2 minutes ago, Cheeseweasel said:

If Corporations are making record profits, why is my 401K getting hammered?

Because the markets and stock valuations have been pretty heavily inflated since like 2015? Stonks thread out front shoulda told ya

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

8 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Because the markets and stock valuations have been pretty heavily inflated since like 2015? Stonks thread out front shoulda told ya

Sir, stonks only go up.

[Incredulity 11561]

5 minutes ago, Cheeseweasel said:

Sir, stonks only go up.

[Trey3216 15325]

1 hour ago, Captainant said:

What are you, some commie pinko? You must generate an acceptable rate of return for the shareholders, laborer. Be thankful you're getting the crumbs you are, otherwise capitalism may fail!

Maybe we should have someone tell him that his profits are obscene, that the doctors and nurses at your local provider's office need to lower their prices now, or face the wrath of the tax man as well as the not so tacit suggestions that the future of his business is in jeopardy.  That should get him in line! 

[Newdoc 3433]

On 11/3/2022 at 7:30 AM, Captainant said:

Hospitals aren't taking it in the shorts, their shareholders are. And since they're entitled to always get profit no matter what, our rates go up. Hooray operating in a captured market that will literally kill or bankrupt you if you don't participate!

Most of the hospital systems in the US are not for profit (although that can be tongue in cheek) while Texas has somewhere just north of 50% for profit but that does mean a significant number of them are not owned by "shareholders".  Many have operated at a serious loss in the last couple of years. So, yes, operating budgets and personnel are being frozen or cut and patient services are hampered and the care you get will suffer or be delayed. Inflationary pressures without flexibility to change income is a major cause. This is reality and not some jaded tribal viewpoint.

[Captainant 27471]

Just now, Trey3216 said:

Maybe we should have someone tell him that his profits are obscene, that the doctors and nurses at your local provider's office need to lower their prices now, or face the wrath of the tax man as well as the not so tacit suggestions that the future of his business is in jeopardy.  That should get him in line! 

The real joke in this is that consumers of healthcare services have any choices whatsoever as to what their prices are, who they can see for care, or what care they can receive. You don't even really do business with your doctor or surgeon - it's always your "insurance" provider that makes the call on when you can even start the process of scheduling an appointment or procedure. The doctors and care providers don't negotiate costs with us, they negotiate them with the 3rd party entity that we have no choice but to use (unless you're rich). And when we pay, we aren't paying the care providers - we're paying the middleman, and the middleman pays the care providers. 

I'd love it if care providers had any choice about what they charged for their services. But they don't lol. BCBS or Aetna or whomever gets to charge prices.

 

And I'm calling bullshit because you'd think that over the course of a global pandemic, in which basically the entire planet is using their INSURANCE plans, that the insurer may have financial difficulties covering so many claims. Since ya know, that's how insurance works if it's ACTUALLY insurance.

I certainly wouldn't expect an insurance firm to see record growth and profits during a period of record claims. 

[Newdoc 3433]

11 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

Maybe we should have someone tell him that his profits are obscene, that the doctors and nurses at your local provider's office need to lower their prices now, or face the wrath of the tax man as well as the not so tacit suggestions that the future of his business is in jeopardy.  That should get him in line! 

Supply side is already suffering. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. It seems some people on here don't remember the gas crisis with price controls 40+ years ago. So we need to do it with energy and health care?

[Incredulity 11561]

3 minutes ago, Newdoc said:

Supply side is already suffering. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. It seems some people on here don't remember the gas crisis with price controls 40+ years ago. So we need to do it with energy and health care?

 

Also add rent to the sirens call of price controls.

Edited November 4, 2022 by Incredulity

[gmr548 16518]

Recession is a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

This. With the economy, perception is reality. A nontrivial portion is that it was talked about so much that prices/wages/etc were raised simply out of expectation, which of course becomes a feedback loop. The same is true of a recession, if people start thinking there’s going to be one, or we’re in one, and behave like that, that can create one on its own; even if they macroeconomics aren’t/weren’t otherwise there.

The political shit flinging in this thread is an example. You have people interpreting the same data points in wildly different ways. Someone’s wrong and the truth is often somewhere in between. Rational actors lol.

[Newdoc 3433]

3 minutes ago, Captainant said:

The real joke in this is that consumers of healthcare services have any choices whatsoever as to what their prices are, who they can see for care, or what care they can receive. You don't even really do business with your doctor or surgeon - it's always your "insurance" provider that makes the call on when you can even start the process of scheduling an appointment or procedure. The doctors and care providers don't negotiate costs with us, they negotiate them with the 3rd party entity that we have no choice but to use (unless you're rich). And when we pay, we aren't paying the care providers - we're paying the middleman, and the middleman pays the care providers. 

I'd love it if care providers had any choice about what they charged for their services. But they don't lol. BCBS or Aetna or whomever gets to charge prices.

 

And I'm calling bullshit because you'd think that over the course of a global pandemic, in which basically the entire planet is using their INSURANCE plans, that the insurer may have financial difficulties covering so many claims. Since ya know, that's how insurance works if it's ACTUALLY insurance.

I certainly wouldn't expect an insurance firm to see record growth and profits during a period of record claims. 

And commercial rates are usually set based on Medicare rates and these have not kept up with inflation.

The system is perverted to highly reimbursed elective procedures and these got put on hold during the pandemic. And there was no large honey pot the government gave hospital systems. It was all a forwarded loan. The patients and clinic filled with Covid patients put the high paid orthopedic and heart and neurosurgeons on the sidelines while hospitals paid traveling nurses and ICU docs 3 times their usual wages to have capacity to treat Covid patients. The hospital system budgets are still reeling from this situation. 

The government and regulating bodies who set the relative rates for reimbursement got exposed during the pandemic. Ever since the inception of Medicare, doctors and hospitals get paid for mostly elective procedural, non intensive procedures because the body that sets the reimbursement rates and hospital payments is made up of specialists with almost no primary (think wellness) care representation.

So, if you really want to control the rise in healthcare prices, then you need to set up more competition in the marketplace instead of this quasi fixed price dance between the government, insurance companies and every Dick and Jane (medical device, pharmaceutical companies, etc.) that wants a piece of the healthcare pie. And you really may want to insist on healthcare instead of this sick care fiasco we have firmly entrenched.

[Gravy Train 974]

23 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

Also add rent to the sirens call of price controls.

Let's first work on legislation to keep Investment Banks from tying up single-family homes as investment vehicles, with premiums paid for by rent.  What was previously available as "starter home" inventory for a family has vanished into perpetual rents.  

And it wasn't just institutional investors, but mom-and-pop investors too.  Property tax code should be addressing the demand-side of SFH investment properties.

[Gravy Train 974]

Debt saturation / Fed Funds rate artificial ceiling breached this soon?

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

4 minutes ago, Gravy Train said:

Debt saturation / Fed Funds rate artificial ceiling breached this soon?

Brrrrt and spend was a bad idea? Who knew??

[Trey3216 15325]

1 hour ago, Newdoc said:

Supply side is already suffering. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. It seems some people on here don't remember the gas crisis with price controls 40+ years ago. So we need to do it with energy and health care?

Yeah, my tongue was firmly planted in cheek with my comment.  It was baked with a smile and sarcasm icing.  

[Trey3216 15325]

1 hour ago, Newdoc said:

And commercial rates are usually set based on Medicare rates and these have not kept up with inflation.

The system is perverted to highly reimbursed elective procedures and these got put on hold during the pandemic. And there was no large honey pot the government gave hospital systems. It was all a forwarded loan. The patients and clinic filled with Covid patients put the high paid orthopedic and heart and neurosurgeons on the sidelines while hospitals paid traveling nurses and ICU docs 3 times their usual wages to have capacity to treat Covid patients. The hospital system budgets are still reeling from this situation. 

The government and regulating bodies who set the relative rates for reimbursement got exposed during the pandemic. Ever since the inception of Medicare, doctors and hospitals get paid for mostly elective procedural, non intensive procedures because the body that sets the reimbursement rates and hospital payments is made up of specialists with almost no primary (think wellness) care representation.

So, if you really want to control the rise in healthcare prices, then you need to set up more competition in the marketplace instead of this quasi fixed price dance between the government, insurance companies and every Dick and Jane (medical device, pharmaceutical companies, etc.) that wants a piece of the healthcare pie. And you really may want to insist on healthcare instead of this sick care fiasco we have firmly entrenched.

Well that, and every Tom, Dick, Harry, Jane and Pat using insurance for every single last medical cost over the past 40 years when that is not the intent of insurance.  

[Gravy Train 974]

14 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

Well that, and every Tom, Dick, Harry, Jane and Pat using insurance for every single last medical cost over the past 40 years when that is not the intent of insurance.  

*Insurance vs cash-pay medial billing codes has entered the chat*

I'm kinda naive to this (fortunately), but don't most treatment centers nearly force patients to use Insurance, if the patient carries a policy?  There's supposed to be some level of transparency in their bill rates, but there's a reason insurance is leveraged the way it has been.

[Neonmoon 38127]

2 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Debt saturation / Fed Funds rate artificial ceiling breached this soon?

Do you believe the US government will be unable to pay our interest debt obligations?

[Gravy Train 974]

2 minutes ago, Neonmoon said:

Do you believe the US government will be unable to pay our interest debt obligations?

Nah fam, taxation man outside shoulda' told you.  There actually are austerity measures baked into the Inflation Reduction Act, though it's a bit more difficult to extract corporate tax when record profittaking has dried up in a recession.

[jimmyjazz 45565]

Oh no, are corporate profits drying up?

[Neonmoon 38127]

Okay good, I was confused by the chicken little tweet you posted about a debt death spiral. 

[LCHorn 2585]

2 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Debt saturation / Fed Funds rate artificial ceiling breached this soon?

Thanks for sharing this; one of my former colleagues on the mortgage banking side keeps drawing attention to this in terms of promoting borrowing on residential real estate-his message is that there’s simply no way out of this besides printing our way out, which is going to be super inflationary down the road (and his point is that loans and land are both great hedges).  

[Parliament 14140]

Five Guys costed me $19 the other night.  What the heck.

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

6 minutes ago, Parliament said:

Five Guys costed me $19 the other night.  What the heck.

That's only $3.80 per guy. You got off pretty cheap.

[tbone_ 14026]

2 coffees and the boiled egg / scone thingy at Starbucks on Saturday morning - $25

[jimmyjazz 45565]

9 minutes ago, tbone_ said:

2 coffees and the boiled egg / scone thingy at Starbucks on Saturday morning - $25

I'm not prone to victim blame, but that's your fault. 

 

[tbone_ 14026]

Not entirely. This was at the Park MGM in Vegas. With the GF. Going down to the lobby and bringing back sustenance on Sat am had its benefits. There was no other choice really.

Still, $25. Damn.

[tbone_ 14026]

Oh and another example - 3 cocktails for me, the GF, and GF’s sister at the hockey game the night before at T-Mobile Arena: $87.

Not a typo. Apparently they were doubles. But still. Got damn.

And the answer to the next question is unfortunately no.

[StassneyHorn 6540]

The last 6 posts make me want to choose violence.

[bernorange 8348]

2 hours ago, Parliament said:

Five Guys costed me $19 the other night.  What the heck.

How much did the blow cost you?

[Shaggy3.0 1695]

3 hours ago, tbone_ said:

Oh and another example - 3 cocktails for me, the GF, and GF’s sister at the hockey game the night before at T-Mobile Arena: $87.

Not a typo. Apparently they were doubles. But still. Got damn.

And the answer to the next question is unfortunately no.

quit your bitchin.  $87 for a menage is a huge discount.

 

[jimmyjazz 45565]

3 hours ago, tbone_ said:

Oh and another example - 3 cocktails for me, the GF, and GF’s sister at the hockey game the night before at T-Mobile Arena: $87.

Not a typo. Apparently they were doubles. But still. Got damn.

And the answer to the next question is unfortunately no.

At first I read that as "we each had 3 cocktails" and thought "what are you bitching about?"

Then I realized you paid $29 per.  Yikes.  

[Humble Beast 258]

7 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Let's first work on legislation to keep Investment Banks from tying up single-family homes as investment vehicles, with premiums paid for by rent.  What was previously available as "starter home" inventory for a family has vanished into perpetual rents.  

And it wasn't just institutional investors, but mom-and-pop investors too.  Property tax code should be addressing the demand-side of SFH investment properties.

You don’t need legislation to do that. Just keep hiking rates or leave them where there currently are for a period of time. US 2 year Tbill yield is 4.65%. Compare that to 5% cap rate and everything that goes with rental properties and for sure new purchases will dry up. Or they will start being sold. 
 

Again all this shit starts with the Fed. 

[52-80 19098]

17 hours ago, Newdoc said:

Most of the hospital systems in the US are not for profit (although that can be tongue in cheek) while Texas has somewhere just north of 50% for profit but that does mean a significant number of them are not owned by "shareholders".  Many have operated at a serious loss in the last couple of years. So, yes, operating budgets and personnel are being frozen or cut and patient services are hampered and the care you get will suffer or be delayed. Inflationary pressures without flexibility to change income is a major cause. This is reality and not some jaded tribal viewpoint.

Inflation is a concept invented and promoted by republicans to drive voting their way

[Captainant 27471]

19 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Let's first work on legislation to keep Investment Banks from tying up single-family homes as investment vehicles, with premiums paid for by rent.  What was previously available as "starter home" inventory for a family has vanished into perpetual rents.  

And it wasn't just institutional investors, but mom-and-pop investors too.  Property tax code should be addressing the demand-side of SFH investment properties.

Lol careful saying this around here, you'll get dogpiled as a commie lib for suggesting that maybe the people living in the homes should be the people owning the homes, rather than paying rents to rent seeking investors. It's absolutely insane how much residential real estate has been bought up by people purely as assets on a ledger. Sure, it's a wonderful hedge, but also you're denying that opportunity to build wealth to someone who just a generation ago would have been able to. 

But hey, those profits by banks and investors are more important than the human dignity  of having some agency and control over your own living situation, amirite? Poors just need to learn to shut up and work and be happy they're getting raises below inflation that come with even more work, while their CEO's are free to take as many roles as they want. Ahhhh good times. 

[Neonmoon 38127]

FHFA announced huge LLPAs for second home/investment properties back in February. But yeah, if you really wanted to kneecap the investment property buying, just make them ineligible for GSE purchase. Private banks could still offer investment property loans, and sell them to private label secondary market. 

[Incredulity 11561]

21 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Let's first work on legislation to keep Investment Banks from tying up single-family homes as investment vehicles, with premiums paid for by rent.  What was previously available as "starter home" inventory for a family has vanished into perpetual rents.  

And it wasn't just institutional investors, but mom-and-pop investors too.  Property tax code should be addressing the demand-side of SFH investment properties.

Doesn’t need legislation.  Just need reasonably functional debt markets and abatement of brrrrt machine money printing.  
 

But that would require a modicum of financial and monetary discipline so legislation will occur(already has in certain locations).  Which will just make the problem worse.

[Armybrat 40748]

22 hours ago, Newdoc said:

And commercial rates are usually set based on Medicare rates and these have not kept up with inflation.

The system is perverted to highly reimbursed elective procedures and these got put on hold during the pandemic. And there was no large honey pot the government gave hospital systems. It was all a forwarded loan. The patients and clinic filled with Covid patients put the high paid orthopedic and heart and neurosurgeons on the sidelines while hospitals paid traveling nurses and ICU docs 3 times their usual wages to have capacity to treat Covid patients. The hospital system budgets are still reeling from this situation. 

The government and regulating bodies who set the relative rates for reimbursement got exposed during the pandemic. Ever since the inception of Medicare, doctors and hospitals get paid for mostly elective procedural, non intensive procedures because the body that sets the reimbursement rates and hospital payments is made up of specialists with almost no primary (think wellness) care representation.

So, if you really want to control the rise in healthcare prices, then you need to set up more competition in the marketplace instead of this quasi fixed price dance between the government, insurance companies and every Dick and Jane (medical device, pharmaceutical companies, etc.) that wants a piece of the healthcare pie. And you really may want to insist on healthcare instead of this sick care fiasco we have firmly entrenched.

Pretty much the same thing my brother said - he was Associate CEO of Seton Hospital decades ago and executive VP of the Texas Hospital Association. He is very happy to be retired. 

[Armybrat 40748]

22 hours ago, Gravy Train said:

Debt saturation / Fed Funds rate artificial ceiling breached this soon?

I have been predicting that scenario for 20+ years on a couple of other forums, but the sunshine pumpers wouldn’t even acknowledge it.

[52-80 19098]

20 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

Do you believe the US government will be unable to pay our interest debt obligations?

Given that the US government controls the means to issue money in the denomination of its current debt obligation, do you think your facile question carries any significance?

A better question is how does the above impact its ability to issue future debt and/or what effect this has on its currency. 

[Humble Beast 258]

27 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

I have been predicting that scenario for 20+ years on a couple of other forums, but the sunshine pumpers wouldn’t even acknowledge it.

Another simplified explanation of the long term problem. 
 

 

[Humble Beast 258]

 

[tbone_ 14026]

Great

[crash_davis 23084]

What we already know. Capitalism, I mean Biden did this!

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/11/04/house-analysis-confirms-corporations-use-cover-inflation-raise-prices-excessively

A report released Friday by a panel of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform highlighted how "certain corporations are using the cover of inflation to raise prices excessively, resulting in record profits and profit margins" at the expense of consumers.

Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), the subcommittee chair, said in a statement that "today's analysis reaffirms what an overwhelming 80% majority of Americans already recognize according to a recent poll: Under the guise of inflation, certain corporations excessively hiked prices far beyond what their costs necessitated, further driving inflation."

"As American corporations report their highest profit margins the United States has seen in over 70 years, executives of leading companies are admitting on earnings calls that they're taking advantage of inflation," the congressman continued. "One executive argued that 'a little bit of inflation is always good in our business' while another admitted that his company's prices wouldn't fall with decreasing costs, stating, 'We don't reduce prices on the back end of these increases.'"

"It is unacceptable that certain companies and industries are engaged in extreme price hikes under the cover of inflation," he declared. "Americans understand this is happening, and they want it to stop. We have an obligation in Congress to shine light on this practice, which is exactly what today’s analysis does."

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

9 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

"It is unacceptable that certain companies and industries are engaged in extreme price hikes under the cover of inflation,"

Why? Supply/Demand should cease to exist when you don't like it? 

And yeah, Oil and Gas are going to have record profits this year due to increasing prices. So what? Eventually, they won't.

How about "Congressmen/women continue to make millions while Americans suffer from their failed policies". Show me that fucking headline.

[crash_davis 23084]

19 minutes ago, Cheeseweasel said:

Why? Supply/Demand should cease to exist when you don't like it? 

And yeah, Oil and Gas are going to have record profits this year due to increasing prices. So what? Eventually, they won't.

How about "Congressmen/women continue to make millions while Americans suffer from their failed policies". Show me that fucking headline.

Supply/Demand is predicated on prices rising and falling based on supply and demand. I have no problems with O&G making an extra buck. Gas/gallon rises and fall (albeit much slower to fall) with regularity. As a country, we need to move from our dependence on oil so that we can rid ourselves of relying on Saudia Arabia, Russia and OPEC for anything, which is another discussion altogether.

But besides the price of a gallon of gas, when have you seen prices fall in grocery stores? Using the pandemic as an excuse to squeeze extra margin is fine if you drop prices after the supply pressure reduces. But we all fucking know that aint happening. 

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

14 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

But besides the price of a gallon of gas, when have you seen prices fall in grocery stores?

Every summer when 10 ears of corn are $1.00. 

[crash_davis 23084]

7 minutes ago, Cheeseweasel said:

Every summer when 10 ears of corn are $1.00. 

4 for a $1.00 was HEB's pre-covid peak harvest summer pricing. This year's price was $0.50 each. 

 

[Cheeseweasel 26437]

4 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

4 for a $1.00 was HEB's pre-covid peak harvest summer pricing. This year's price was $0.50 each. 

 

HEB creates artificial demand by being closed. 

[Humble Beast 258]

56 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

Supply/Demand is predicated on prices rising and falling based on supply and demand. I have no problems with O&G making an extra buck. Gas/gallon rises and fall (albeit much slower to fall) with regularity. As a country, we need to move from our dependence on oil so that we can rid ourselves of relying on Saudia Arabia, Russia and OPEC for anything, which is another discussion altogether.

But besides the price of a gallon of gas, when have you seen prices fall in grocery stores? Using the pandemic as an excuse to squeeze extra margin is fine if you drop prices after the supply pressure reduces. But we all fucking know that aint happening. 

A pipe dream. And just moves our dependency to a different, stronger adversary. 
 

1 hour ago, crash_davis said:

What we already know. Capitalism, I mean Biden did this!

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/11/04/house-analysis-confirms-corporations-use-cover-inflation-raise-prices-excessively

A report released Friday by a panel of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform highlighted how "certain corporations are using the cover of inflation to raise prices excessively, resulting in record profits and profit margins" at the expense of consumers.

Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), the subcommittee chair, said in a statement that "today's analysis reaffirms what an overwhelming 80% majority of Americans already recognize according to a recent poll: Under the guise of inflation, certain corporations excessively hiked prices far beyond what their costs necessitated, further driving inflation."

"As American corporations report their highest profit margins the United States has seen in over 70 years, executives of leading companies are admitting on earnings calls that they're taking advantage of inflation," the congressman continued. "One executive argued that 'a little bit of inflation is always good in our business' while another admitted that his company's prices wouldn't fall with decreasing costs, stating, 'We don't reduce prices on the back end of these increases.'"

"It is unacceptable that certain companies and industries are engaged in extreme price hikes under the cover of inflation," he declared. "Americans understand this is happening, and they want it to stop. We have an obligation in Congress to shine light on this practice, which is exactly what today’s analysis does."

I think the solution is more central planning. Specifically, I’m cool with whatever Rep Krishnamoorthi thinks will take care of it. He seems to have his finger on the pulse of the problem in a totally righteous way and will be ready to adapt as his policies change how our economy works.  

[jimmyjazz 45565]

There's a difference between pricing of a worldwide commodity and pricing of a microwave oven.  These retail executives are telling you exactly what they are going to do -- maintain inflated prices even when costs drop back down.  Oil and gas has never really had that luxury.