“Inflation is not calming.”
That sentence keeps showing up because households are watching a different scoreboard than economists.
Today, Fed Chair Kevin Warsh is signaling rate hikes may still be needed while the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge remains well above its 2% target.
Here’s the part worth remembering:
Inflation has two clocks.
Clock #1: how fast prices are rising.
Clock #2: the higher price level you are already stuck paying.
If inflation falls from 6% to 3%, groceries do not rewind. They just get more expensive more slowly.
Then higher interest rates can hit a second time through credit cards, HELOCs and variable-rate debt.
So tonight, make a two-line card:
3 REPEAT PRICES — eggs, fuel, electric, insurance, whatever keeps biting.
1 RATE-SENSITIVE BALANCE — credit card, HELOC, variable loan.
Now you can see both clocks instead of arguing with one national percentage.
The easiest clock to attack is often one repeat grocery item you can stop buying every single unit of.
TAKE ONE REPEAT PRICE OFF THE RECEIPT
The 4 Foot Farm Blueprint is a beginner system built around producing one useful food in about four feet of space. The digital system is still $7.
There’s another household bill I’d attack before winter: electricity.
This presentation is built around how Americans are heating their homes while slashing electric bills. That is exactly the kind of claim worth inspecting when your second inflation clock is utilities.
The shareable takeaway:
Don’t ask whether inflation is “up” or “down.” Ask which prices stayed high—and which debts can still reprice.
— Seamus Gerry III
P.S. Completely different bill, same control instinct: this off-grid water design shows a second household water path →
Signal sources reviewed: Aug. 29 reporting on Fed Chair Kevin Warsh and current PCE inflation data.