A question about U.S.A. money and the government

[Roger House]

Although I MAY BE wrong, I think that, at times on the t.v. news shows, especially from republican friendly news shows, I have heard them say that, if the government, (just?), prints more money, the value of the U.S. dollar will drop. If this "value dropping" thing is correct, then I have a question. Let me first say that, I'm just a, what you might call, lowly peon citizen who has never been to college and who works at the fuel island of a Kroger grocery store. Also, I have never been outside of the "lower 48", as it's said, U.S. states, and I probably never will be; I have NO need or reason to. Here's my question: If the government ever DOES print more money and the value of the U.S. dollar does drop, can I still take the money that I get and pay my rent and bills, buy groceries, keep good repair clothes and shoes on hand, and have some cable t.v. and internet entertainment? If yes, then WHY should and/or do I care if/that the value of the U.S. dollar drops. Thank you.

[Snidely]

On Sunday or thereabouts, Roger House declared ...

> Although I MAY BE wrong, I think that, at times on the t.v. news shows,
> especially from republican friendly news shows, I have heard them say that,
> if the government, (just?), prints more money, the value of the U.S. dollar
> will drop. If this "value dropping" thing is correct,

It is.

> then I have a
> question. Let me first say that, I'm just a, what you might call, lowly peon
> citizen who has never been to college and who works at the fuel island of a
> Kroger grocery store. Also, I have never been outside of the "lower 48", as
> it's said, U.S. states, and I probably never will be; I have NO need or
> reason to. Here's my question: If the government ever DOES print more money
> and the value of the U.S. dollar does drop, can I still take the money that I
> get and pay my rent and bills, buy groceries, keep good repair clothes and
> shoes on hand, and have some cable t.v. and internet entertainment? If yes,
> then WHY should and/or do I care if/that the value of the U.S. dollar drops.
> Thank you.

You will need more money to buy same amount of groceries and shoes, and
your rent, cable, and internet will use more of your money.

An imperfect analogy, but still illustrative: Suppose you have a 10"
pizza cut into 6 slices; you give your landlord 3 pieces and he says,
"You're good for another month, your rent is paid."

Now suppose that someone says we need to make more slices, so now your
10" pizza is cut into 10 slices. Will your landlord still be happy
with 3 slices?

Even if you get lucky, and it's a 12" pizza cut into 10 slices, your
landlord is going to expect more than 3 slices.

For an extreme example of printing more making the money less powerful,
look up "Weimar Republic". Lots of other examples are out there, too,
including many from Italy.

/dps


--
And the Raiders and the Broncos have life now in the West. I thought
they were both nearly dead if not quite really most sincerely dead. --
Mike Salfino, fivethirtyeight.com

[hymie!]

In our last episode, the evil Dr. Lacto had captured our hero,

Roger House <61rr...@gmail.com>, who said:
>If the government
>ever DOES print more money and the value of the U.S. dollar does drop,
>can I still take the money that I get and pay my rent and bills, buy
>groceries, keep good repair clothes and shoes on hand, and have some
>cable t.v. and internet entertainment? If yes, then WHY should and/or
>do I care if/that the value of the U.S. dollar drops. Thank you.

If the value of the dollar drops, then your dollar has less purchasing
power. You can still buy gasoline, but you will pay $4 per gallon instead
of $3 per gallon. You can still buy clothes, but your shirt will cost
$15 instead of $12. You can still buy food, but your milk will cost $5
per gallon instead of $4 per gallon.

Is your job going to pay you more dollars, to compensate for the loss in
purchasing power of the dollars you get?

--hymie! http://nasalinux.net/~hymie hy...@nasalinux.net

[Sanford Manley]

Even more simple: The more money circulating in relation to
the goods and services the country produces, the more likely
that prices will go up.

Further, the COVID-19 crisis made many people drop out
of the labor force and started a trend where businesses
have to pay more for help. This also affects raw material
prices and of course, transportation costs are up as oil
skyrockets.

--
Sanford M. Manley

"Trying to be right all the time
is a very subtle way of being wrong."

[Les Albert]

On Sun, 3 Apr 2022 18:25:30 -0700 (PDT), Roger House
<61rr...@gmail.com> wrote:

>Although I MAY BE wrong, I think that, at times on the t.v. news shows, especially from republican friendly news shows, I have heard them say that, if the government, (just?), prints more money, the value of the U.S. dollar will drop. If this "value dropping" thing is correct, then I have a question. Let me first say that, I'm just a, what you might call, lowly peon citizen who has never been to college and who works at the fuel island of a Kroger grocery store. Also, I have never been outside of the "lower 48", as it's said, U.S. states, and I probably never will be; I have NO need or reason to. Here's my question: If the government ever DOES print more money and the value of the U.S. dollar does drop, can I still take the money that I get and pay my rent and bills, buy groceries, keep good repair clothes and shoes on hand, and have some cable t.v. and internet entertainment? If yes, then WHY should and/or do I care if/that the value of the U.S. dollar drops. Thank you.

You received some good answers to your money question. Here is
another good explanation at https://www.econ.iastate.edu/node/673

Les