Ned Ludd's Inflation Quest

A letter from fellow mad farmer, Ned Ludd, regarding his strange evening while on his quest to to discover the cause of inflation.

I received a concerning letter from neighbor, friend, and fellow mad farmer, Ned Ludd, regarding his exceedingly strange evening a few weeks ago. Ned was kind enough to enclose a true account of what transpired as recorded in his journal on the night of July 4, 2023. With his permission, I share it here.

Ahoy Gally,

When the price to refuel the truck doubled in a few months, I didn’t think much of it. When the price of the chickens’ feed doubled in a season, I couldn’t be bothered to re-reckon the price of our eggs. When the price of toilet paper rose by a third, I switched to the New York Times. No problem. But by God when the local brewery raised the price of my daily bread four times in the last year, I’ve had enough. Which is usually what the bar-man tells me at the end of the night.

It’s time to get to the bottom of this mess. I’ve been diligently keeping my ears open lately and I’ve been clued in on a few possibilities.

One of them comes from the current European Union Commissioner, Ursula von der Leyen. I’ve never trusted anyone with four names before, but there’s a first time for most things, and this is one of them. She’s also a doctor, but more importantly, a physician. And anyone who knows a convoluted  subject like physics is bound to know a thing or two about inflation.

Well she, that is, Mrs. Von der Leyen, got up in front of an auditorium resembling a set of Star Trek the other week, and told all those distinguished folks in their nice suits that climate change is causing inflation. When I heard this I nearly had a heart attack, which are now also, I’m told, caused by climate change. To think, all this time I was walking around like a consummate ass with the assumption that printing oil tankers of money could be responsible. And all along it was the climate, which as far as I can make out includes just about everything in the world. 

That was news to me. Normally I’d keep some healthy skepticism about myself, especially when it comes from a bureaucrat, but this claim was collaborated by Mr. William Gates.

Bill Gates never went to college. I’m not saying that to knock the guy. I know plenty of inspired idiots who were given a degree. I tip my hat to a man who never had any medical training in his life, but who’s able, willing, and sought after to direct a global health crisis. If that’s not the American dream, well, it should be now. The man’s got the sociability of a slug, but he’s got brains like he’s got money. And he used a lot of that money to buy up a lot of farmland till he’s now the biggest owner of farmland in the whole country. Not a bad investment. Unlike dollars, they’re not making any more of it, and everybody’s got to eat.

Mr. Gates knows how to combat inflation since he was a key voice in getting the “historic”, Inflation Reduction Act passed. With a name like that, there’s no if’s, and’s, or but’s about the intent of that bill. And intent, not the act, is what matters in the court of law.

Like Mr. Gates, and every member of our Congress, I’ve never read a word of it. But according to these smart folks, we are causing climate change, which is causing inflation. So in a roundabout way, we’re causing inflation. And apparently the best way to fight ourselves, and therefore inflation and the climate, is to print trillions of new dollars for solar panels and bombs. And get rid of cows. 

I’ve never put much hope in machines or killin people to solve problems, and I do love my ole cows. How they munch that meadow makes my heart throb. So this news doesn't sit well with me. Though, I suppose it’s true what Upton Sinclair wrote down on a piece of paper, or maybe it was a typewriter, “Never trust a man to understand somethin’ when his job depends on him not understandin’ that thing.” I just wouldn’t be able to see the truth of the matter if it fell on my head. 

All this contemplating worked up a mighty thirst which sent me right off to the brewery where I managed to have a few words with the bartender, Jarda, before I sat at my usual table near the back of the garden next to the two goats who stood at the fence coveting my beer. 

Jarda’s not quite middle aged, not quite elderly. He’s got an owl-like bearing about him and he wears a black vest with clean, shiny buttons. So I trust what he has to say. I asked him for his thoughts on the whole inflation ordeal and he told me this little tale.

You know who Salvador Dali is, don’t you?

In the Caribbean, sure.

Not El Salvador, you oaf, Salvador Dali! The artist.

Oh, right, of course… The one who cut his ear off.

That’s Van Goghe! You Americans, uncultured, the whole lot of you.

Jarda took a sip of his walnut liquor, stroked his gray goatee, and continued. 

Salvador Dali. Wouldn’t you know, people decided they liked his artwork before he tipped over. On account of this he was pretty well renowned towards the end of his life, and had even made some money. He went to work spending it as fast as he could on caviar, cognac and women.

In that order?

Jarda stroked some more. 

Probably. Eventually he went broke in just the way Hemingway described, slowly at first, then all at once. Poor Salvador couldn’t stand to waste away his last days sitting alone in an empty flat. That’s when he created his greatest work of all - his magic checkbook.

His what now? Why was it magic?

Jarda took a puff of his e-cigarette. 

I’m getting there. Don’t interrupt the story. 

Mr. Dali would invite all his friends to the nicest restaurant and spend a grand evening drinking the finest wines, devouring thick, bloody steaks, accompanied by bottles of cognac. When the night would draw to a close and the owner of the restaurant arrived with the bill, Ole Sal would calmly reach in his breast-pocket and produce his magic checkbook. He’d fill out the check and sign his name, start to hand it to the owner, and pause, like something just occurred to him. He’d turn the check over to the back side, scribble a little drawing, sign his name and hand the check to the owner. His own Salvador Dali original.

Jarda leaned against the bar looking satisfied with himself with that smirk of his and closed his left eye temporarily.

I bet the owner never cashed that check.

The smirk turned into a look of exasperation.

Of course they never cashed the check! That’s why it was a magic checkbook.

Right you are old friend. I get it. That’s a nice story. What’s it got to do with inflation?

The way I see it, the U.S.A’s got the magic checkbook. We’ll see how long they can write checks before someone decides to start cashing them.

By this point the twenty-seven or so people who had cued up at the bar started plotting my demise, so I thanked Jarda, finished my beer, and ordered another one while keeping my eyes closed as I handed over my coins to pay.

Now I’ve drunk quite a few cold ones at the brewery, but no amount of tanks of the barley nectar could’ve prepared me for what happened next. 

One of the goats, the handsomer one with the more studious look about him, cleared his throat and announced that he could explain the true nature of inflation, and if I were to be so kind as to give him a sip of my beer to wet his tongue, he’d be more than happy to educate me. I sat there dumbfounded for a moment, passed over the pint, and patiently waited.

Wendy Leedy 

He shook the foam off his goatee and asked, somewhat redundantly, 

Price of the beer has gone up this year, hasn’t it?

It sure has! Four times in the last year. It’s getting to the point a man’s got to set his priorities.

But a beer is still a beer right?

Yea and chicken eggs are still chicken eggs.

You’ve got it flipped around. The price of beer and eggs didn’t go up. The value of your paper went down. 

I suppose it did. 

It’s really a tax on saving and anyone with a fixed income. It’s a whole lot easier to print money than pass a tax hike and forget about trying to cut pensions. The whole machine has to grow to survive. Smart people don’t save money. Only suckers save because everyday money sits, it rots like wet hay. Invest, buy, consume, grow! That’s the name of the game. You’re a farmer, Ned, I know that. I’ve  seen you up here yacking about your crops and livestock. What’s it like to run a farming business, with inflation the way it is?

Ah hell, it’s like trying to build a house, but the dimensions of the lumber keep changing. It does make you wonder, don’t it, what would happen if one day all those digits and pieces of paper aren’t worth a New York Times anymore?

The goat passed the beer back to me and crossed his front legs. 

It’s one big fairytale. The dollar is the best story ever told. You two-leggers kill each other over religion, but it doesn’t matter what God you believe in, you’ll accept dollars. 

A guy’s got to believe in something, I guess.

The goat snorted out a laugh. That’s right. Elon Musk believes we’re living in a simulation. 

Well hell, I can’t blame him. If I married the same gal twice, I’d probably think that too. 

There was a pause. I passed the rest of the beer to the goat and he gulped it greedily. The big pines swayed over the now quite garden as the cold air slipped off the hills into the valley, the soft glow of lantern light made the goat look like the devil himself. We sat there staring at each other and then a pinecone fell right on my head. 

“Ned, are you okay.”

I looked up. It was Peter the brew-master.

Hey there Peter. Yea sure, I’m fine. Why?

You’ve been talking to that goat for about half an hour.

I turned back to the goat. He was behind the fence staring through me, chewing on a cud of grass.

"I think you’ve had enough.”

I don’t know if I really got to the bottom of the matter, but that’s the honest-to-God truth of what happened.

- Ned Ludd

Mad Farmer