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And indeed, what was true a century ago seem still to hold. Everyone seems to hate/fear inflation, but it has radically different impacts on different groups within our society…

Inflation is widening America’s wealth gap.

• Prices have risen across the nation, and so have wages across all income levels.

• The lowest-earning households gained an average of $500 in earnings last year. But their expenses grew by almost $2,000.

• Meanwhile, the upper half of earners pulled further ahead as their incomes outgrew expenses significantly.

“Whom does inflation hurt the most?” from Scott Galloway (@profgalloway)

* William Dean Howells

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As we ferret out unfairness, we might cautious birthday greetings to James Mill; he was born (James Milne) on this date in 1773. A historian, economist, political theorist, and philosopher (a close ally of Utilitarian thinker Jeremy Bentham), he is counted among the founders of the Ricardian school of economics (and so, among other things, a father of monetarism, the theory that excess currency leads to inflation).

His son, John Stuart Mill, studied with both Bentham and his father, then became one of most influential thinkers in the history of classical liberalism (perhaps especially his definition of liberty as justifying the freedom of the individual in opposition to unlimited state and social control). JSM also followed his father in justifying colonialism on Utilitarian lines, and served as a colonial administrator at the East India Company.

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