Islamic State’s medieval Brutality in the 21st century
It’s only right that the country should debate the consequences of the decision to step up our role in the mess that is Syria/Iraq and the insane actions of IS and other global Islamic extremists.
Regardless of where you stand on the issues in question ( and there are many , both political and ethical ) spare a thought for the UK pilots ( and all pilots & other personnel) whom are now pawns in this new kind of war and will be flying over enemy territory as they take the fight to IS and their deluded followers.
How can anyone forget the brutal execution of Jordanian pilot Muath Al-Kasasbeh , burnt alive in a cage after a demonic stage show that saw him make his past masked IS fighters lining the route to the cage that would be his final destination and brutal execution.
On a sunny day in 1970 my osteomyelitis was finally given the all clear and I was on my way home from the hospital, for a couple of years at least. I was so heartbroken to leave Nurse Brown, that on the day of my discharge I hid in a broom cupboard, in the childish belief if they couldn’t find me they would let me stay in the children’s ward with Nurse Brown.
The day before dad had explained to me that we had a new home and that‘s where I would be going to live when I left hospital. He explained that we had moved to Glencairn to be near his family, so that our grandmother could help look after us. We all loved my grandmother dearly and although I was grief stricken at the thought of leaving…
Tabby’s Star, the explanation that has everyone so intrigued, is that an alien civilization may be building a megastructure.
Beginning tonight (October 26, 2016), and over two more nights more in the coming two months, astronomers will use the Green Bank radio telescope in rural West Virginia to observe Tabby’s Star. Tabby herself – astronomer Tabetha Boyajian, formerly of Yale and now at Louisiana State University – will be there to help lead the observations.
Her Ted Talk earlier this year created a sensation when she called this star “the most mysterious in the universe.” Beginning tonight, the Breakthrough Listen project at University of California Berkeley is devoting eight hours per night for three nights to observing Tabby’s Star with the Green Bank telescope. The astronomers admit it’s a long-shot, but they want to see if this telescope can detect signals from a possible extraterrestrial civilization that might – or might not – reside on a planet orbiting this star.
Get Involved
The astronomers will also be doing a live chat from Green Bank Observatory today starting at 2000 UTC (4 p.m. Eastern, 1 p.m. Pacific; translate to your time zone) about the upcoming observations of Tabby’s Star.
KIC 8462852 (also Tabby’s Star or WTF Star) is an F-type main-sequence star located in the constellationCygnus approximately 454 parsecs (1,480 ly) from Earth. Unusual light fluctuations of the star were discovered by citizen scientists as part of the Planet Hunters project, and in September 2015 astronomers and citizen scientists associated with the project posted a preprint of a paper on arXiv describing the data and possible interpretations.
The discovery was made from data collected by the Kepler space telescope, which observes changes in the brightness of distant stars to detect exoplanets.
Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain the star’s large irregular changes in brightness as measured by its unusual light curve, but none have fully explained all aspects of the curve. The leading hypothesis, based on a lack of observed infrared light, posits a swarm of cold, dusty comet fragments in a highly eccentric orbit. Another hypothesis is that of a large number of small masses in “tight formation” orbiting the star.
It has been speculated that the changes in brightness could be signs of activity associated with intelligent extraterrestrial life constructing a Dyson swarm. The SETI Institute‘s initial radio reconnaissance of KIC 8462852, however, found no evidence of technology-related radio signals from the star.
KIC 8462852 is not the only star that has such large irregular dimmings. However, all other such stars are young stellar objects called YSO dippers that have different dimming patterns. An example of such an object is EPIC 204278916.
The names “Tabby’s Star” and “Boyajian’s Star” refer to the initial study’s lead author, Tabetha S. Boyajian; KIC 8462852 is also known as the “WTF Star”, after the study’s subtitle “Where’s The Flux?” (a joking reference to the colloquial expression of disbelief “WTF”).
Apparent location
Map showing location of NGC 6866. KIC 8462852 is northeast between NGC 6866 and ο¹ Cygni.
KIC 8462852 in Cygnus is located roughly halfway between the major visually apparent bright stars Deneb (α Cyg, α Cygni, Alpha Cygni) and Delta Cygni (δ Cyg, δ Cygni) to the eye as part of the Northern Cross. KIC 8462852 is situated south of Omicron¹ Cygni (ο¹ Cygni, 31 Cygni), and northeast of the star clusterNGC 6866.While only a few arcminutes away from the cluster, it is unrelated and closer to the Sun than it is to the star cluster.
With an apparent magnitude of 11.7, the star cannot be seen by the naked eye, but is visible with a 5-inch (130 mm) telescope in a dark sky with little light pollution.
History of observations
KIC 8462852 was observed as early as the year 1890. The star was cataloged in the Tycho, 2MASS, UCAC4 and WISEastronomical catalogs (published in 1997, 2003, 2009 and 2012, respectively).
The main source of information about the luminosity fluctuations of KIC 8462852 is the Kepler space observatory. During its primary and extended mission from 2009 to 2013 it continuously monitored the light curves of over 100,000 stars in a patch of sky in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra.
Luminosity
Observations of the luminosity of the star by the Kepler space telescope show small, frequent, non-periodic dips in brightness, along with two large recorded dips in brightness appearing to occur roughly 750 days apart. The amplitude of the changes in the star’s brightness, and the aperiodicity of the changes, mean that this star is of particular interest for astronomers. The star’s changes in brightness are consistent with many small masses orbiting the star in “tight formation”.
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The first major dip, on 5 March 2011, obscured the star’s brightness by up to 15%, and the other (on 28 February 2013) by up to 22%. In comparison, a planet the size of Jupiter would only obscure a star of this size by 1%, indicating that whatever is blocking light during the star’s major dips is not a planet, but rather something covering up to half the width of the star.
Due to the failure of two of Kepler‘sreaction wheels, the star’s predicted 750-day dip around April 2015 was not recorded; further observations are planned for May 2017.
The irregular light dips do not show a pattern.
In addition to the day-long dimmings, a study of a century’s worth of photographic plates suggest the star has gradually faded from 1890 to 1989 by about 20%, which would be unprecedented for any F-type main sequence star. However, teasing accurate magnitudes from long-term photographic archives is a complex procedure, requiring adjustment for equipment changes, and is strongly dependent on the choice of comparison stars. A contrasting study, examining the same photographic plates, concluded that the possible century-long dimming was likely a data artifact, and not a real astrophysical event.
A third study, using light measured by the Kepler observatory over a four-year period, determined that KIC 8462852 dimmed at about 0.34 percent per year before dropping dramatically by about 2.5 percent in 200 days. It then returned to its original slow fade rate. The same technique was used to study 193 stars in its vicinity and 355 stars similar in size and composition to KIC 8462852. None of these stars exhibited such dimming.
Hypotheses
Based on KIC 8462852’sspectrum and stellar type, its changes in brightness could not be attributed to intrinsic variability; while a few hypotheses have been proposed involving material orbiting the star and blocking its light, none of these fully fit the observed data.
Some of the proposed explanations involve instrument or data artifacts, interstellar dust, a series of giant planets with very large ring structures, a recently captured asteroid field, the system undergoing Late Heavy Bombardment, and an artificial megastructure orbiting the star.
Younger star with coalescing material around it
Artist’s impression of a young star with coalescing material around it
Astronomer Jason Wright (who was consulted by Boyajian) and others who have studied KIC 8462852 have suggested in a follow-up paper that if the star is younger than its position and speed would suggest, then it may still have coalescing material around it.
Artist’s impression of a massive collision with a proto-planet
High-resolution spectroscopy and imaging observations have also been made, as well as spectral energy distribution analyses using the Nordic Optical Telescope in Spain. A massive collision scenario would create warm dust that glows in infrared wavelengths, but there is no observed excess infrared energy, ruling out massive planetary collision debris.
Other researchers think the planetary debris field explanation is unlikely, given the very low probability that Kepler would ever witness such an event due to the rarity of collisions of such size.
As with the possibility of coalescing material around the star, spectroscopic studies using the NASA IRTF found no evidence for hot close-in dust or circumstellar matter from an evaporating or exploding planet within a few astronomical units of the central star.
Similarly, a study of past infrared data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer found no evidence for an excess of infrared emission from the star, which would have been an indicator of warm dust grains that could have come from catastrophic collisions of meteors or planets in the system. This absence of emission supports the hypothesis that a swarm of cold comets on an unusually eccentric orbit could be responsible for the star’s unique light curve, but more studies are needed.
A cloud of disintegrating comets
Artist’s impression of an orbiting swarm of dusty comet fragments
One proposed explanation for the reduction in light is that it is due to a cloud of disintegrating comets orbiting the star elliptically. Under this scenario, gravity from a nearby star may have caused comets from KIC 8462852’sOort cloud to fall in-system. Evidence supporting this hypothesis includes an M-type red dwarf within 132 billion kilometers (885 AU) of KIC 8462852. However, the notion that disturbed Oort cloud comets orbiting elliptically close to the star could exist in high enough numbers to obscure 22% of the star’s observed luminosity has been doubted.
Submillimetre wavelength observations searching for farther-out cold dust in the system’s Kuiper Belt suggest that a distant “catastrophic” planetary disruption explanation is unlikely; the possibility of a disrupted Kuiper Belt scattering comets into the inner system is still to be determined.
An artificial megastructure
Artist’s impression of a Dyson swarm
Astronomer Jason Wright and others who have studied KIC 8462852 hypothesized that the objects eclipsing the star could be parts of a megastructure made by an alien civilization, such as a Dyson swarm, a hypothetical structure that an advanced civilization might build around a star to intercept some of its light for their energy needs. Due to extensive media coverage on this matter, KIC 8462852 has been compared by Kepler‘s Steve Howell with KIC 4110611, another star with an odd light curve (which proved, after years of research, to be a part of a five-star system). Regarding the current light curve data of KIC 8462852, Wright has emphasized the importance of upcoming spectral studies. According to Wright, the likelihood of extraterrestrial intelligence being the cause of the dimming is very low; however, the star remains an outstanding SETI target because natural explanations have yet to fully explain the dimming phenomenon.
Follow-up studies
Many optical telescopes are monitoring KIC 8462852 in anticipation of another multi-day dimming event, with planned follow-up observations of a dimming event using large telescopes equipped with spectrographs to determine if the eclipsing mass is a solid object, or if composed of dust or gas. Additional follow-up observations may involve the ground-based Green Bank Telescope, the Very Large Array Radio Telescope, and future orbital telescopes dedicated to exoplanetology such as WFIRST, TESS, and PLATO.
A fund-raising campaign was led by Tabetha Boyajian, the author of the initial study on KIC 8462852’s anomalous light curve. The project proposes to use the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network to continue observation of the star in the future and observe it in additional wavelengths to reveal new details on the composition of the objects obfuscating the star. The campaign raised over US$100,000, enough for one year of observations.
SETI results
In October 2015, the SETI Institute used the Allen Telescope Array to look for radio emissions from possible intelligent extraterrestrial life in the vicinity of the star.[56][57] After an initial two-week survey, the SETI Institute reported that it found no evidence of technology-related radio signals from the star system.
No narrowband radio signals were found at a level of 180–300 Jy in a 1 Hz channel, or medium-band signals above 10 Jy in a 100 kHz channel. Another SETI-related study, one using archival VERITAS gamma-ray observatory observations from 2009 to 2015, found no evidence of pulsed optical beacons associated with KIC 8462852.
Astronomer Jason Wright and his colleagues plan to conduct another search beginning in October 2016 using West Virginia’s Green Bank Telescope.
A star called EPIC 204278916, as well as some other young stellar objects, was observed to have similar dips to those observed in KIC 8462852. However, they differ in many aspects. EPIC 204278916 shows much deeper dips than KIC 8462852, and the dips seem to be grouped over a short period of time, whereas the dips at KIC 8462852 are spread out over several years. Further, EPIC 204278916 is surrounded by a proto-stellar disc, while KIC 8462852 appears to be a normal F-type star displaying no evidence of a disc.
See also
PSR B1919+21, a pulsar mistaken for an alien radio signal (LGM-1)
Strange messages coming from the stars are ‘probably’ from aliens, scientists say.
‘It is too early to unequivocally attribute these purported signals to the activities of extraterrestrial civilizations,’ a group of scientists looking for aliens have warned – but the signals are encouraging.
Scientists have heard hugely unusual messages from deep in space that they think are coming from aliens.
A new analysis of strange modulations in a tiny set of stars appears to indicate that it could be coming from extraterrestrial intelligence that is looking to alert us to their existence.
The new study reports the finding of specific modulations in just 234 out of the 2.5 million stars that have been observed during a survey of the sky. The work found that a tiny fraction of them seemed to be behaving strangely…….
Disclaimer – The views and opinions expressed in these documentary are soley intended to educate and provide background information to those interested in the Troubles of Northern Ireland. They in no way reflect my own opinions and I take no responsibility for any inaccuracies or factual errors.
Operation Flavius
The execution of three members of the IRA in Gibraltar set in motion the chain of events that would lead to the killings of David Howes and David Howes
Operation Flavius (also referred to as the “Gibraltar killings“)[1][2] was a controversial military operation in which three members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) were shot dead by the British Special Air Service (SAS) in Gibraltar on 6 March 1988. The three—Seán Savage, Daniel McCann, and Mairéad Farrell—were believed to be mounting a bombing attack on British military personnel in Gibraltar. SAS soldiers…
Below is a comprehensive list of 60 films about the “Troubles” and Republican/Loyalist paramilitaries . The list includes background information on the movies and where possible I have incl…
Fouzia Azeem (Urdu: فوزیہ عظیم; 1 March 1990 – 15 July 2016), better known by the name Qandeel Baloch (Urdu: قندیل بلوچ), was a Pakistani model, actress, woman’s rights activist and social media celebrity. Baloch rose to prominence due to her videos on social networks discussing her daily routine and various controversial issues.
Baloch first received recognition from the media in 2013, when she auditioned for Pakistan Idol; her audition went viral and she became an Internet celebrity. She was one of the top 10 most searched for persons on the internet in Pakistan and both celebrated and criticised for the content of her videos and posts.
During the evening of 15 July 2016, Baloch was asphyxiated while she was asleep in the house where her parents live in Multan. Her brother Waseem Azeem confessed to the murder saying she was “bringing disrepute” to the “family’s honour.
Early life
Baloch was born on 1 March 1990 in Dera Ghazi Khan, Punjab. She hailed from Shah Sadar Din. She had six brothers and six sisters. Her first job was as a bus hostess.
Career
Baloch’s fame was based on her social media posts – pictures, videos and comments. These were considered bold by the largely conservative Pakistani community.Some international news media compared her to Kim Kardashian; however, local commentators stated that she was more significant than Kardashian, as Baloch “went against the norms of society” and lived life on her own terms.
In June 2016, Baloch met senior cleric MuftiAbdul Qawi in a hotel room to learn more about her faith; the interaction between them brought about mayhem on social media platforms as their photos went viral online. She also wore a hat with the Mufti’s signature. The meeting led to the Mufti being suspended from his position on one of Pakistan’s religious committees.
A previous stunt which spread in social media was her promise to strip dance for her nation and to dedicate her dance to cricketer Shahid Afridi if Pakistan won the Twenty20 match against India on 19 March 2016. She released a teaser on social media, which went viral, but Pakistan lost the match. Some Indian media compared her with Poonam Pandey at this point due to her controversial personality.
As her media presence grew, Baloch began to use her position to comment on women’s position in Pakistani society. The week before she died, she released a music video entitled Ban, which mocked the restrictions placed on women in the country.In an interview with controversial anchor Mubashir Luqman, Baloch named Sunny Leone, Rakhi Sawant and Poonam Pandey as her inspirations.
She also said that many organizations, people and media groups were calling her to feature in their shows to increase their own ratings.
Security concerns
Following the June 2016 meeting with Qawi, Baloch reported that she received death threats both from him and from others.
At around the same time, Baloch’s ex-husband described in the media their brief marriage, revealing intimate details of their relationship. Baloch claimed her husband had been abusive, and cried publicly about the pain of the marriage.
Around 14 July 2016, Baloch spoke by phone to a reporter from the Express Tribune paper and stated that she feared for her life. She told the reporter that she had sought protection from the police but on receiving no response, had decided to move abroad with her parents after the Eid al-Fitr holiday as she felt unsafe in Pakistan.
Personal life
Baloch married Ashiq Hussain in 2008, aged 17, and had one son with him.Baloch left her husband a year later, saying he was abusive. There are reports Baloch was separated from a second marriage.
Death
On 15 July 2016, Baloch was drugged and then asphyxiated by her brother Waseem while she was asleep at her parents’ home in Multan. Her death was reported by her father Azeem. It was first reported as a shooting, but an autopsy report confirmed that Baloch was murdered by asphyxiation while she was asleep, on the night of 15–16 July, around 11:15 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. By the time her body was found she had already been dead for between fifteen and thirty-six hours.
Marks on Baloch’s body revealed that her mouth and nose were pinned shut to asphyxiate her. Police said that they would investigate all sides of the murder including honour killing.
A First Information Report against her brother Waseem and another brother Aslam Shaheen, who allegedly persuaded Waseem to kill their sister, was issued.[Baloch’s father Azeem stated in the FIR that his sons Aslam Shaheen and Waseem were responsible for their sister’s death and had killed her for her money. Her father told the press:
“my daughter was brave and I will not forget or forgive her brutal murder.”
Waseem was arrested on the evening of 16 July. He confessed to murdering his sister, saying :
“she [Qandeel Baloch] was bringing disrepute to our family’s honour and I could not tolerate it any further. I killed her around 11:30 p.m. on Friday night when everyone else had gone to bed. My brother is not involved in the murder”
The state was named as complainant in the murder case, making it impossible for the victim’s family to pardon the perpetrator (see the Pakistani diyaa law).
FIR nomination against Mufti Abdul Qavi
Mufti Abdul Qavi’s name has been mentioned in First Information Report (FIR) in an application of Qandeel’s father Azeem.He was already being investigated by the Multan police at the time of murder.
“I really feel that no woman is safe in this country, until we start making examples of people, until we start sending men who kill women to jail, unless we literally say there will be no more killing and those who dare will spend the rest of their lives behind bars.”
She further said,
“There is not a single day where you don’t pick up a paper and see a woman hasn’t been killed… this is an epidemic.”
British Prime Minister Theresa May also condemned the murder saying
“there is absolutely no honour in so-called honour killings and they should be referred to as acts of terror.”
May also said it was ‘criminal’ for women to be murdered by their male relatives on the grounds of defending family ‘honour’. The daughter of the Pakistani Prime Minister Maryam Nawaz announced that the government had finalized the draft law against honour killings in the light of negotiations and the final draft will be presented to a committee of joint session of parliament on July 21 for consideration and approval.”
The Shankill Bomb 23rd October 1993 The Shankill Road bombing was carried out by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on 23 October 1993 and is one of the most notorious incidents of the Tr…
An American soldier wears a hand lettered “War Is Hell” slogan on his helmet, Vietnam, 1965
During the Vietnam War on June 18, 1965 173rd Airborne Brigade Battalion member Larry Wayne Chaffin smiles for the camera.
AP photojournalist Horst Faas took this iconic photo on June 18, 1965, during the Vietnam War with the 173rd Airborne Brigade Battalion on defense duty at Phouc Vinh airstrip in South Vietnam. The headband message “War is Hell” typified an acerbic attitude of many young American soldiers who were likely drafted and sent to the remote southeastern Asia jungles to engage in deadly and terrifying combat.
A lot of the soldiers wrote graffiti on their helmets with inscriptions of their attitudes about where they were and why they were there.
The contrast is what makes this photo iconic. You have this, bright, young handsome soldier with a smile on his face and then you have the text on his helmet. Take the helmet out, and this could easily be a high school yearbook photo. His face betrays a sense of innocence, but when you look at his helmet, you can tell that he is anything but. You know that he has witnessed the horrors of war firsthand and is trying to cover it all up on the outside.
The identity of the soldier was unknown for many decades until recently when he was identified as Larry Wayne Chaffin from St. Louis. He served with that brigade in Vietnam for exactly one year beginning in May 1965 and when the photo was taken he was 19. Chaffin had many problems adjusting to civilian life when he returned from Vietnam.
With Wife Fran Chaffin Morrison
He died at the age of 39 from complications that arose from diabetes, an ailment he might have contracted from exposure to Agent Orange while serving in Vietnam.
He died in 1985.
Colour Version 1
Colour Version 2
The “War is Hell” quote originates from William Tecumseh Sherman’ address to the graduating class of the Michigan Military Academy (19 June 1879); but slightly varying accounts of this speech have been published. Sherman was a Union Army general during the American Civil War. He succeeded General U.S. Grant as commander of the Western Theatre of that war in the spring of 1864.
The full quote:
“I’ve been where you are now and I know just how you feel. It’s entirely natural that there should beat in the breast of every one of you a hope and desire that some day you can use the skill you have acquired here. Suppress it! You don’t know the horrible aspects of war. I’ve been through two wars and I know. I’ve seen cities and homes in ashes. I’ve seen thousands of men lying on the ground, their dead faces looking up at the skies. I tell you, War is Hell!“.
Born in Berlin, Germany, Faas began his photographic career in 1951 with the Keystone Agency, and by the age of 21 he was already covering major events concerning Indochina, including the peace negotiations in Geneva in 1954. In 1956 he joined the Associated Press (AP), where he acquired a reputation for being an unflinching hard-news war photographer, covering the wars in Vietnam and Laos, as well as in the Congo and Algeria. In 1962, he became AP’s chief photographer for Southeast Asia, and was based in Saigon until 1974.
His images of the Vietnam War won him a Pulitzer Prize in 1965. In 1967 he was severely wounded in the legs by a rocket-propelled grenade. In 1972, he collected a second Pulitzer, for his coverage of the conflict in Bangladesh. Inside Bangladesh, photographer Rashid Talukder considered it too dangerous to publish his photographs and he released them more than twenty years after Horst’s photographs had appeared.
Faas is also famed for his work as a picture editor, and was instrumental in ensuring the publication of two of the most famous images of the Vietnam War. The notorious “Saigon Execution” photograph, showing the summary execution of a Viet Cong prisoner by Saigon police chief Nguyễn Ngọc Loan, taken by Eddie Adams in Saigon on February 1, 1968 was sent under his direction. Nick Ut‘s famous “Napalm Girl” photograph caused a huge controversy over at the AP bureau; an editor had objected to the photo, saying that the girl depicted was naked and that nobody would accept it. Faas ordered that Ut’s photo be sent over the wire.
In September 1990, freelance photographer Greg Marinovich submitted a series of graphic photos of a crowd executing a man to the AP bureau in Johannesburg. Once again, AP editors were uncertain if the photos should be sent over the wire. One editor sent the images to Faas, who telegrammed back, “send all photos.”
In 1976, Faas moved to London as AP’s senior photo editor for Europe; he retired in 2004. In retirement he organised reunions of the wartime Saigon press corps and ran international photojournalism symposiums.
He produced four books on his career and other news photographers, including Requiem, a book about photographers killed on both sides of the Vietnam War, co-edited with fellow Vietnam War photojournalist Tim Page.
In 2012 the subject of his iconic photo (a soldier at Phouc Vinh airstrip) is claimed to be Larry Wayne Chaffin, a soldier with the 173rd Airborne Brigade Battalion, who was on defence duty (18 June 1965) during the Vietnam War.
Awards
1965: Pulitzer Prize (Photography): “For his combat photography of the war in South Viet Nam during 1964.”
Inflation is seldom out of the news these days and the wife asked me to explain it to her – so here you are dear –
Inflation is defined as a sustained increase in the general level of prices for goods and services. It is measured as an annual percentage increase. As inflation rises, every dollar you own buys a smaller percentage of a good or service.
inflation
noun
noun: inflation
2.
Economics
a general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money.
“policies aimed at controlling inflation”
What is Inflation?
The value of a dollar does not stay constant when there is inflation. The value of a dollar is observed in terms of purchasing power, which is the real, tangible goods that money can buy. When inflation goes up, there is a decline in the purchasing power of money. For example, if the inflation rate is 2% annually, then theoretically a $1 pack of gum will cost $1.02 in a year. After inflation, your dollar can’t buy the same goods it could beforehand.
There are several variations on inflation:
Deflation is when the general level of prices is falling. This is the opposite of inflation.
Hyperinflation is unusually rapid inflation. In extreme cases, this can lead to the breakdown of a nation’s monetary system. One of the most notable examples of hyperinflation occurred in Germany in 1923, when prices rose 2,500% in one month!
Stagflation is the combination of high unemployment and economic stagnation with inflation. This happened in industrialized countries during the 1970s, when a bad economy was combined with OPEC raising oil prices.
In recent years, most developed countries have attempted to sustain an inflation rate of 2-3%.
Causes of Inflation
Economists wake up in the morning hoping for a chance to debate the causes of inflation. There is no one cause that’s universally agreed upon, but at least two theories are generally accepted:
Demand-Pull Inflation – This theory can be summarized as “too much money chasing too few goods”. In other words, if demand is growing faster than supply, prices will increase. This usually occurs in growing economies.
Cost-Push Inflation – When companies’ costs go up, they need to increase prices to maintain their profit margins. Increased costs can include things such as wages, taxes, or increased costs of imports.
Costs of Inflation
Almost everyone thinks inflation is evil, but it isn’t necessarily so. Inflation affects different people in different ways. It also depends on whether inflation is anticipated or unanticipated. If the inflation rate corresponds to what the majority of people are expecting (anticipated inflation), then we can compensate and the cost isn’t high. For example, banks can vary their interest rates and workers can negotiate contracts that include automatic wage hikes as the price level goes up.
Problems arise when there is unanticipated inflation:
Creditors lose and debtors gain if the lender does not anticipate inflation correctly. For those who borrow, this is similar to getting an interest-free loan.
Uncertainty about what will happen next makes corporations and consumers less likely to spend. This hurts economic output in the long run.
People living off a fixed-income, such as retirees, see a decline in their purchasing power and, consequently, their standard of living.
The entire economy must absorb repricing costs (“menu costs”) as price lists, labels, menus and more have to be updated.
If the inflation rate is greater than that of other countries, domestic products become less competitive.
People like to complain about prices going up, but they often ignore the fact that wages should be rising as well. The question shouldn’t be whether inflation is rising, but whether it’s rising at a quicker pace than your wages.
Finally, inflation is a sign that an economy is growing. In some situations, little inflation (or even deflation) can be just as bad as high inflation. The lack of inflation may be an indication that the economy is weakening. As you can see, it’s not so easy to label inflation as either good or bad – it depends on the overall economy as well as your personal situation.
belfastchildis.com 