Probably not...
The pro-cyclical advice is flowing fast and furious
This is going to be a shorter than normal note. Hold the applause. Over the past week, I had a number of discussions on podcasts and on the radio about my open letter to the Treasury Secretary and the disinterest in bonds. My personal favorite was a discussion with Maggie Lake of Wealthion. You might notice that it took place from a construction site — the world is not sitting still, even when I do.
And then I read the comments. While I typically avoid this exercise (“Don’t read the comments!” is sage advice from any public speaker), when I am introducing new concepts (e.g. “buy bonds, you fools” [not investment advice]), I do check them because it helps me understand what examples/analogies “work” and which do not, as well as where the audience is completely missing the point I am trying (often inelegantly) to make. Clearly, this new shtick needs some work:
And those were the kind ones. Some were a bit more personalized:
If anyone knows where my “paid off” check went, I’d appreciate the insight. I post these not because I want your sympathy, but rather to illustrate a different point. I learned long ago that presenting facts does not change perspectives except at the margin. Facts do not break identity. They threaten it. And when identity is threatened, the mind does not ask, “Is this true?” It asks, “What must I believe to remain myself?” A good example is the 2018 documentary, “Behind the Curve”:
From Wikipedia: The 2018 documentary Behind the Curve followed two groups of American Flat Earth believers who were attempting to gather first-hand empirical proof for that belief. One group from the YouTube show GlobeBusters used a ring laser gyroscope in an attempt to show that Earth was not rotating. Instead, they detected the actual 15-degree-per-hour rotation of Earth, a measurement they dismissed as corrupted by the device somehow picking up the rotation of the "firmament". Another group used lasers in an attempt to show a several-mile stretch of water is perfectly flat by measuring the distance between the water level and the laser beam along three vertical posts. They were unable to align the beam as they expected to because the surface of the still water was in fact bent by several feet over the distance measured; the experiment was dismissed as inconclusive.
What we are largely seeing in these comments is “identity politics.” The most popular tribe in the Western World is currently the “I do not trust the government” tribe. And it’s a useful exercise to ask yourself, “Do I object to the data because I can prove it’s wrong or do I object to the data because it challenges my world view/identity?” I am finding the “understated inflation” story to be the latter.
I want to be perfectly clear — I cannot PROVE that the government is not lying to you about inflation. I can DEMONSTRATE to you that private researchers tracking inflation find that government-reported inflation is overstated:
