To wonder why the economy, and people are struggling financially when the government could just.. ‘print’ more money to plow into it.

[RisenWhine]

I just find it absolutely bizarre that businesses, NHS, education, benefits, taxpayers struggle so hard when money is literally a man made concept that we print and just ‘decide’ how much to have? Just ‘print’ more, if we created money and let’s be honest it’s just numbers, numbers are infinite.. put more into the NHS.. put more into education..

There is absolutely no reason anyone should have to struggle with money at it just baffles me that the UK is the way that it is because of some shite we made up 🤣

Erm, inflation?

But then the money we already have would be worth less.

If it's so simple why do you think that we're not doing that?

Christ.

I assume you are being sarcastic, but about what or who? Has someone suggested this? Or are you seriously this stupid?

Come back and post when you’re having to take a wheelbarrow full of fifties to the corner shop for a pint of milk, OP.

Haaaa good one

When you print more, the value of each £ is less. So you need more £ to have the same standard of living. Google hyperinflation.

Genius. OP for PM.

Look up Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). Also try reading about Universal Basic Income.

To an extent, you and PP are right. Because the GBP is a sovereign currency, the UK government could behave very differently to fund the NHS etc by just accepting an increase in the national debt and printing money. But they do have to manage inflation. However, it isn't actually necessarily a good thing to "balance" a national budget.

Everything would just cost more you would be no better off and neither would the NHS or any other body.

If I ruled the world I would make Mr Musk and his billionaire friends share their wealth evenly.

surely we can just reset the world by sharing all wealth. Everyone equal. Makes sense doesn’t it?

You didn’t learn about Weimar Germany in history then I’m guessing.

I would recommend Economics for Dummies by Sean Flyn

I would recommend "Economics for Dummies" by Sean Flyn.

The other good case study is Japan. Japan almost follows MMT rather than traditional economic models and has a national debt of 230% GDP. But it isn't bankrupt as a country or suffering inflation in the way traditional economic thinking would predict.

Mate, I remember asking this question when I was about 8 years old.

First you were talking about printing money. Now you are talking about socialism. Which is it?

Countries did print money during Covid.

It spikes inflation and then measures needs to be put in place to bring inflation down. People's interest rates soar until inflation is lower.

All these ideas have been tried - often with catastrophic results

OP, as others have said printing more money creates inflation as it basically just reduces the value of existing money. The bank of England has historically sometimes operated "quantitative easing" (effectively, printing more money) in response to the banking crash in 2008 and COVID. They're currently trying to do the opposite. It's quite interesting if you read about it.

Maybe socialism then. I just think everything should be equal. I don’t see why anyone should suffer over a man made concept. It can be changed.. someone just doesn’t want to?

No question is a stupid question. Some countries do literally print money for this purpose but they are for parallel business currencies that are used for specific purposes to boost the economy.

See this example

https://monneta.org/en/sardex/

And yes, tax the billionaires absolutely

@RisenWhine - sorry for all the posters that are mocking you. It is actually a very valid question and not all economic theorists agree that that the current zeitgeist is the only way to make a country run. As well as the books others have recommended try

Utopia for Realists - Rutger Bregman
The Deficit Myth - Stephanie Kelton

You'll get a range of views that way.

Usual kind MN answers I see 🙄.

risen the BBC sounds series 'Understand the economy' is good for this stuff.