Peter's Blog

May’s economic data tells a story that sounds good on the surface but gets more complicated the closer you look. The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released its report Friday showing personal income climbed 0.7 percent last month, adding $181.6 billion, with disposable income rising by that same margin. Americans didn’t sit on that extra […]

As Kevin Warsh takes over as Fed chair, his stated preference for narrower, trimmed inflation measures is drawing scrutiny, and for good reason. Though it is technically correct that government-driven price hikes from wars, lockdowns, and years of interventionist policy are not “inflation” in the strict monetary sense, Warsh’s push to exclude them from the […]

Inflation’s embers flared again in May, dashing hopes that last year’s price scare was fading. The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) rose 0.5 percent for the month, lifting the headline rate to 4.2 percent year-over-year and marking a second straight acceleration. Energy was the chief culprit, and the renewed heat pushed safe-haven […]

American households are plummeting to razor-thin financial margins as the personal savings rate falls to numbers last seen before COVID.  Personal savings fell from around 4.3% of disposable income in January to just over 2.5% in April, all as the cost of living continues to climb. Americans are drawing down reserves to cover groceries, housing, […]

For generations, the wisdom passed down at kitchen tables was simple: spend less than you earn, save patiently, and let time do its quiet work. That world has been inverted. For over two decades, the Federal Reserve has systematically penalized savers through artificially low interest rates and persistent inflation, undermining the concepts of sufficiency and […]

In his latest appearance on VRIC Media, Peter walks through how rising prices, renewed balance-sheet expansion and growing debt shape the case for real money. He connects headline numbers to policy choices, explains who wins and who loses from inflation, and doubles down on gold as a reliable store of value. He begins by flagging […]

April’s Consumer Price Index offered scant comfort to households or policymakers, with headline prices rising 0.6 percent for the month and 3.8 percent from a year earlier, according to Wednesday’s Bureau of Labor Statistics release. Though the monthly pace eased from March’s blistering 0.9 percent gain, the yearly rate accelerated, underscoring that the inflation fire […]

With the latest 12 month CPI figure coming in at 3.3%, it’s clear that inflation is alive and well. What’s less clear to the public is the fact that inflation is a policy choice– an intentional political act meant to rob citizens of the benefits of falling prices. The following article was originally published by […]

Over a century of central banking has instilled an irrational fear of falling prices in the American public. But the reality is that falling prices are what make our economic lives better, and inflation, the regime’s preferred monetary policy, is far worse than deflation. The following article was originally published by the Mises Institute. The […]

With inflation still running hot and disastrous jobs data coming in, it’s tempting for policymakers to spread myths about the economy, particularly around the origin and nature of money. As the Austrian school demonstrates, fiat money– and all money for that matter– does not derive its value from dictates of the government. The following article […]