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@ Guy Swann
2025-05-23 19:53:04
It’s actually not true despite it being a common refrain:
Consumption is entirely a product of production and the reason we need such high consumption of fast churn products and services is BECAUSE our money doesn’t hold value.
In other words, because the stock of money doesn’t hold, we need people to buy another version of our stupid product next year too, because last year’s money is bleeding. We need fresh inflows at fresh pricing.
So it’s a feedback loop both ways:
Good quality products and good quality money mean you can sell one year, and don’t need to rush to get the “next version” out immediately because the money is growing in value due to the productivity and sustainability of their better product. This they can take time and look for that which actually moves the needle for their next endeavor.
While the opposite is also true. If the money from this year’s product falls in value, they need to turn it over into another version quickly at a better price point. And importantly, they need to make sure they don’t hit their next year’s sales by making something that’s too good this year. It’s important that it becomes obsolete or degrades to ensure they can sell another batch when their savings has lost 20% of its value to churn out another dose of inflows to keep the machine going.
In an inflationary market, really good products literally choke the company’s longevity by squeezing out future sales. In a deflationary one, the best products distributed the furthest grant enormous advantage and capacity to build more truly valuable improvements.