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Show Ftil.Phillipr IP POPPER EXPLAINS INFLATION "Popper, can you explain inflation infla-tion so I can understand it?" "Don't bother me now, son, I'm too busy." "How long will you be busy, popper?" pop-per?" "I'll always be too busy when anybody any-body wants me to explain inflation." (Voice from Mother "Aw, go on and help Junior out! He's got to write a school essay.") "Well, ahem, sonny, it's like this, ahem . . . inflation means a condition condi-tion under which the dollar will be worth less." "But it will still be a dollar, won't it?" "Yes. A dollar bill will still be a dollar bill, but it won't be the dollar dol-lar that we used to know. What I mean is that while a dollar may still be a dollar, strictly speaking, its value as a dollar will not be the same value as it would have been if there had been no change in values . . . ahem ... Is that quite clear to you?" "No. Is it to you?" "No. Let's try it a different way. Let us take meat for example. Take a $100 bill. Now let us assume that this $100 will buy a stack of steaks piled up 45 feet in the air. Got that?" "Forty-five dollars will buy 100 steaks piled up how high, popper?" "No. Now, take your time. We've got our steaks piled up 45 feet. And right now we can buy them for the $100 bill." "What hundred dollar bill, popper?" "Shush! Now, then, comes Inflation In-flation . . . What happens?" "That's what I'm asking, popper?" pop-per?" "Well, we suddenly look around and find that while the steak pile is still 45 feet high the $100 bill has shrunk down to $32.79." "Huh?" "No, that's wrong. Let's make it easier. The $100 bill is still O.K., but the steaks have changed. In fact, the pile is now only 20 feet high. See?" "Is that in regular steak or hamburger, ham-burger, popper?" "Omigosh! Any steak. I don't even have to use steak in this story. I could use eggs or liver or even codfish cakes. I could make it just as clear if I used a suit of clothes, a new tie, a pair of shoes or a bicycle." bi-cycle." "Let's do it with codfish cakes and bicycles, popper." "Why!!!" "It'll be more fun." (Voice from Mother "Gee, Clinton, Clin-ton, I don't think you're explaining it to Junior very simply.") "Very well. Now lissen, son. Let us take house paint. Today $25 will get me enough paint to paint our garage two coats." "We haven't any garage." "Don't interrupt. Let's paint it, anyhow. Comes inflation, and what happens if we want to paint it a year from now? Twenty-five dollars will only buy enough to paint three sides, and only one coat. Do you see what happens?" "Yes. We write Mt. Roosevelt and he paints the other side at government expense, popper. But what CAUSES inflation?" "Awah-h-h!" THE SMITHY Beside the empty used car mart The village smithy stands; The smith is mighty glad of heart. For business still expands. The busy forge he engineers Is, like his heart, aglow This man has waited fifty years To say, "1 told you so!" Gerald Raftery in the N. Y. Times. He hears a motor, and its noise Comes to him from afar; It passes and he says, "Look, boys, It IS a motorcar!" Then once again his sledge he swings And says, as well he may, "I knew when I first saw them things They wasn't here to stay!" "High-heeled shoes are to be discontinued dis-continued for the duration to save leather." News item. Wanna bet? Merrill Chilcote says there can't be any manpower shortage. "All those fellows who have been standing stand-ing around excavations watching foundations for new buildings laid can't be working indoors," he says. ... TOE HOARDER AT HOME Our table's getting bare, you bet, Though good food I demand; My wife says it's too early yet To open food she's canned. Merrill Chilcote. "The WPB has frozen all canned sauerkraut until April 1943." News item. Ima Dodo is terribly upset She says cold sauerkraut is awful. And what she's afraid of is that it may now be turned out in flavors in sauerkraut cones. |
