On 6/23/07, Louis Proyect <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
The Independent, 23 June 2007 08:31
Leading article: We have to accept that the era of cheap food is coming
to an end
What is pushing up global commodity prices? It is likely that a
substantial demand shift is beginning to affect prices
It is hard to imagine that a "substantial demand shift" is
simultaneously underway across all possible commodity classes (oil,
food, metals), asset classes (stocks, real-estate) and even services
(college tuitions, medical care). It seems to me that a monetarist
explanation (i.e. money supply increases) is much better than a
supply/demand based explanation. The CPI does not seem to support a
monetarist theory but if I am not mistaken, the CPI conveniently
excludes food, energy, medicine and just about any item that cannot be
imported from China.
-raghu.
