Defense Attorneys Want To Raise Threshold For Felony Theft Due To Inflation
This story is interesting in the context of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announcing yet another round of quantitative easing (also known as printing more money and devaluing the currency already in circulation). Here in North Dakota a group of defense attorneys want the threshold for felony theft raised by the legislature from $500 to $1500.
Their reasoning? Well, $500 isn’t worth what it used to be worth. A sign of the times:
Right now, a person who steals more than $500 can be charged with a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison.
Myerchin says the $500 threshold has been in place for more than 30 years. He says the figure would be more than $2,000 if it were adjusted for inflation.
Myerchin’s estimate isn’t quite accurate. According to an inflation calculator provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the $500 figure would be $1,193.67. But that’s still a big drop in value, and doesn’t really change Myerchin’s point.
In fact, it represents a more than 58% decline in the value of $500 over the last 30 years. This means that, within the space of my lifetime, our dollar is worth less than half of what it was.
Inflation taxes us all. Especially when the government starts printing money as a way to finance run-away spending and, supposedly, stimulate the economy. That policy is not making us richer. It is making us poorer.
Tags: ben bernanke, Economy, Inflation, jobs, monetary policy, paul myerchin, quantitative easing
