Substantial Friedman

Milton Friedman is famous for having said "inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." Indeed, he makes much of it in Money Mischief: "I believe I first published the statement in these words in Friedman (1963)," he writes. And in his preface he makes the statement the "central thesis" of his book.

Sometimes, though, writers leave out a word here and there. I do. In my previous post I wrote, "The tweak shows that money increased more quickly than prices." What I meant was, "The tweak shows that 'the quantity of money relative to output' increased more quickly than prices." Taken literally, the difference is significant. But extra words weigh down the thought and make it more difficult to toss and catch.

Writers leave out words sometimes. Friedman left out the word substantial. Not every time. But enough that the lighter phrase caught on. People say, "Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." Friedman said "substantial inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." He even put it in italics.

Milton Friedman's Mischief

On the left is a scan of one of the graphs from Milton Friedman's book Money Mischief; on the right is a tweak of that scan.  [Regarding the tweak...]

For the figure on the left, I moved the "Figure 3" label to the bottom and reduced the size of the text below the "Figure 3". Otherwise this figure is not retouched.

In the figure on the right, I moved the label, reduced the text, and shifted the "money" line up so that the two lines start at the same level. That makes it easier to compare the trends. And I erased the Y-Axis labels because shifting the trend line makes those labels incorrect. (These tweaks were all done in Paint.)
The tweak shows that money increased more quickly than prices. Funny -- that's not what you might expect. If printing money causes inflation, the two lines should travel together. They don't.