This is the "common sense" view of inflation. It was disproven by Milton Friedman and others over 50 years ago.
“Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon in the sense that it is and can be produced only by a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output.”
In 2021, "the quantity of money" is a much harder concept to measure than it was, but the basic insight stands.
In Macroeconomics, it's often very hard, because once you've understood something, the various actors can adapt to the new knowledge, and then you have a new and different world economy.
That is, if you publish your findings. I assume there are unpublished insights people use to get rich off.
I think Friedman's analysis was mostly historical. At least that what I got from reading his book. I've certainly not read any academic papers.
In Microeconomics, people can and do prove things based on models that are quite good at approximating reality.
The interest/unemployment mechanism for controlling inflation has worked really well, and is why most of the Western world can hit its 2% inflation targets.
As an example, average restaurant profit margins are between 2% and 6%. They cannot absorb labor rate increases without raising prices or going bankrupt. Margins tend to be similarly low for many other industries as well. Tech is a massive outlier in its ability to absorb large wage increases.
Restaurants do also have a tendency to be run out of business and replaced by other restaurants when the minimum wage gets hiked though. Restaurant owners take hikes extremely personally. The market can be an unkind mistress.
McDonalds, Dollar General, Chick-fil-a, and many others are really in the real estate/property space. They just have an affiliated model that supports their (real estate) investments and reduces their risk (of holding vacant commercial property).
What's the cost of not being willing to pay employees enough to care about doing a good job and hiring enough people to enable good work? I know plenty of people who've stopped eating out or order less because overworked and underpaid employees keep making mistakes.
Most views hold that increasing the minimum wage increases the cost of goods and services, in particular food, also increasing downstream things like rent, but it's still a debated point and not settled. [1]
Wording a polarized opinion worded as a fact is an attempt to force this opinion on a discussion is a dishonest move, to say the least. Am I rude here to point out that it's his opinion that somehow came on top?
It is when you are probably wrong and in disagreement with most economists, and don't post any citations or evidence. Like, argue for a minority position, but argue, don't just insult.
When two income households became the norm, rather than having more disposable money, the money went into housing costs. Those who owned housing (land) before two-income was normal made out like bandits, but families that didn't are now working 100 hours a week rather than 50 hours a week for the same post-housing income.
