John T. Reed’s hyperinflation/deflation blog
Stocking up on milk as preparation for hyperinflation
Posted by John Reed on
Copyright 2012 by John T. Reed One of the simplest solutions I urged in my book How to Protect Your Life Savings from Hyperinflation & Depression, 2nd Edition is to buy everything you will ever need now. Of course, that’s an exaggeration, but it is the best and most memorable way to state the principle. Obviously, you will be glad you bought everything before the prices went up during hyperinflation. Can’t get it at any price Unobviously, if you read the history of past periods of hyperinflation as I have, you learn that hyperinflation is not just about prices. It is...
Cost of traveling between U.S. and Canada
Posted by John Reed on
Copyright 2012 by John T. Reed I have since last year invested in Canadian dollars in Canada and urged readers to do the same. I expected to learn details that would make me and my readers better at going there and transferring money there, but the details are always surprising. 1. Wires cost $45—and take five or six days!? Mailing a check is very cheap, but Canadian mail service is astonishingly slow. If I mail a letter or package to, say, Bellingham, WA, it gets there in a couple or three days. Bellingham is near the Canadian border. But it...
Closing of USAA subscriber account
Posted by John Reed on
Copyright 2013 by John T. Reed Last spring, I wrote an article telling readers how my USAA “subscriber account” had accumulated to $6,700 over 45 years of being a USAA member. USAA is an insurance company for current and former military and their families. They created a “subscriber account” for what they claim are regulatory and legal reasons. They are a mutual company—that is—owned by policy holders. Whatever. As one who writes about How to Protect your Life Savings from Hyperinflation & Depression, I was horrified to see that I had $6,700 in USD-denominated assets in that account. I wrote...
Comments on David Wessel’s WSJ article ‘Why Dollar Is King Despite U.S. Woes’
Posted by John Reed on
Copyright 2013 John T. Reed The 12/5/13 Wall Street Journal has an article with the above title. Google that title to read it. The Dollar Trap book The article mainly summarizes a new book The Dollar Trap by Eswar Prasad, a Brookings Institution economist. 1. governments around the world force their banks to hold U.S. dollars (USD) 2. When their currency goes up in value against the dollar, exports are hurt, so the governments intervene which means buying USD to drive down the value of their own currencies. Switzerland and Japan have recently said they were and would continue to...
Why has ‘Quantitative Easing’ not yet caused inflation?
Posted by John Reed on
Copyright 2013 by John T. Reed On page C1 of the 1/23/13 Wall Street Journal there is an article titled “QE’s Impact Defying Logic.” It basically wonders why “Quantitative Easing” has not yet caused inflation and suggests people who have said “Quantitative Easing” will cause inflation may therefore be wrong. First off, I don’t give a damn about the fact that “Quantitative Easing” has not yet caused inflation. One of my detractors, who shall remain unidentified, claims the fact that I have been saying for years that we are going to get hyperinflation and we have not yet is sufficient...