Grifters and Goldbugs and Bears, Oh My!: Peter Schiff Edition
Live from Jackson Hole 2015 Weblogging: We of What Recovery? and all of our friends at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Economic Policy Conference and Drinking Party are not the only people up in Jackson Hole this week. There is the American Principles Project down-valley somewhere--a conference of grifters and goldbugs, charging their attendees a healthy sum, because, they say, current Federal Reserve policies are dangerously inflationary, and so they need to "bring sanity back to U.S. monetary policy". Their top five headlined speakers: George Gilder--Chairman, George Gilder Fund and former Reagan advisor. Steve Moore--Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Heritage Foundation. Benn Steil, PhD--Senior Fellow & Director of International Economics, Council on Foreign Relations. Peter Schiff--Financial Analyst. Jim DeMint--President, Heritage Foundation.
I have already dealt with conference organizer Steven Lonegan and the top three headliners: George Gilder, Stephen Moore, and Benn Steil. Now it is on to Peter Schiff: Let me outsource this to Nate Heckmann:
(2013): Peter Schiff is Wrong About Everything: "A libertarian friend of mine... sent me a video... [of] Peter Schiff...
...[who] responds to his critics who attacked him for a prediction he made at the end of 2009 about hyperinflation:
You know, look, I know inflation is going to get worse in 2010. Whether it’s going to run out of control or it’s going to take until 2011 or 2012, but I know we’re going to have a major currency crisis coming soon. It’s going to dwarf the financial crisis and it’s going to send consumer prices absolutely ballistic, as well as interest rates and unemployment. According to Schiff, the reason we haven't seen hyperinflation yet is because the CPI is flawed, "deliberately designed" by the government to hide the true rate of inflation.
The video was so bad, it compelled me to write this post. First, watch...
I don't recommend it: it's fifteen minutes long:
Then read about what Schiff gets wrong:
1) "I never said the money printing would cause inflation. I said the money printing is inflation."...
2) "But Krugman would say that Peter Schiff is wrong because prices haven't risen. But, again, the proof that he offers, and that other Keynesians offer, are government-created statistics that purport to measure inflation like the CPI."...
3) "The CPI does a lousy job of measuring inflation. And I think it deliberately does so by design."...
4) "In fact, I'm not the only one that's convinced that inflation is a lot higher than the government admits."...
5) "Well, if the government is correct, if the CPI is accurate, then why are so many people worried about inflation that doesn't exist?"...
6) "After all, what makes more sense? That the government can print all this money, and prices not rise? Or that prices are rising and the government is just not being honest?"...
Of course, honest people who do look for biases and errors in the CPI look hard, and find that the CPI is doing pretty well:
Unlike Benn Steil--who, in my judgement, is just a goldbug and a maroon, and not a grifter--it seems clear to me that Schiff joins Moore, Gilder, Lonegan, and others in the grifter contingent.
