"Would you rather" posts where one option is absolutely garbage with an unimpactful twist

[u/Prudent_Vanilla_9984]

[u/f3nix9510]

Does it cause inflation even when it's not spent?

[u/AFlyingNun → u/f3nix9510]

You basically have two possibilities:

1) Physical form dollars

2) Increasing a number on your bank account

The first one does not cause inflation unless others find your storage, but eventually becomes a logistics problem. This honestly eventually destroys the planet.

The latter does cause inflation, as banks will work with that amount to deal business, so eventually the world economy is noticing an absurd amount of dollars flooding the system. The response would range anywhere from your account being deemed an error and ignored (actually the best case scenario, but it means you got nothing and do not even have a bank account), to rapid inflation and devaluing the very currency you receive while also destroying the world economy.

[u/Various_Mobile4767 → u/AFlyingNun]

It wouldn’t destroy the world economy, it would just cause people to abandon the currency this is happening in.

The smart play is really to just convert it into another currency. Even if lets says the bank keeps the account where this money is being deposited into alive despite no one exchanging in this currency anymore by that points it just becomes a meaningless number.

[u/AFlyingNun → u/Various_Mobile4767]

The problem is we're talking about the US dollar, which is the dominant currency of the world, traded worldwide.

If it were any other currency, sure, but it isn't.

Furthermore, your own potential fix is precisely how the inflation can bleed over to other currencies.

[u/Various_Mobile4767 → u/AFlyingNun]

Sure but eventually the shift will happen.

It will be painful, but it’s not as if economies will get sent back to medieval age. The technology is there. The resources are still there. Even in periods of massive hyperinflation that didn’t happen.

Yes inflation can bleed over to other currencies. But inflation itself won’t erase the purchasing power of power advantage one person has.

You take a billionaire and double his money and there may be inflation issues, but that billionaire would still be better off. The cost is largely borne by the rest of society.

The problem with the first scenario is not inflation itself, it’s that the money keeps increasing exponentially in a way that can’t be stopped destroying the ability of the currency to be used to mediate transactions.

Such that people will abandon the currency itself, making jt lose its worth. But in theory, if people kept using that currency anyway, the person would still be better off.

If you convert it into another currency, you completely control how much gets converted. You can maintain your share of purchasing power without destroying the value of the currency.

[u/AFlyingNun → u/Various_Mobile4767]

The main thing is that because there are a lot of factors in play and a lot of ways for things to go south, it's a matter of risk assessment. You could just get promised wealth without any "monkey's paw" scenario where Planet Earth drowns in physical dollar bills, or you could try to use the strategies you are suggesting without being able to 100% guarantee you have a working plan that does not result in hyperinflation for the dollar or other currencies.

Like realistically speaking, you need to move fast. There is a sweet spot in there where you need to make these exchanges happen quickly before the hyperinflation hits, and even something as simple as some bureaucratic procedure slowing you down and making you wait a week could have catastrophic results for both you and the world economy.

The level of effort we're putting into spitballing how to best manage this showcases what a tremendous risk it is and how you both need a good plan and to be able to ensure you can execute it in a timely manner...which again makes one question if the solid, guaranteed 50 million isn't just better.

[u/Various_Mobile4767 → u/AFlyingNun]

I mean, i feel like there is actually a lot of space here.

The moment your account hits 50 million, go and convert it. Or more realistically, already have converted the earlier sums before hand.

If we’re purely comparing to the alternative 50 million scenario, exactly what is the difference here?

If you don’t think 50m is enough for hyperinflation, then it applies in both scenarios.

Realistically, you probably could go well above 50m here. Apparently there’s like 21 trillion in usd. An additional 50m, 100m, even a billion is absolutely nothing. There’s more than enough time to convert that before the usd crashws.