You're being lied to every day, and you don't even notice it — because the lie is wrapped in the respectable packaging of government statistics and expert commentary from serious people in expensive suits.
When an official solemnly announces that inflation was "only" 4-5%, they're telling a technical truth — while simultaneously committing a grand deception. Because the Consumer Price Index (CPI) measures the cost of survival, not the cost of living. It excellently tracks how much it costs not to starve and not to freeze on the street. But it's fundamentally blind to how much it costs to live with dignity, to climb the social ladder, to give your children a chance at a better future.
And while you celebrate "moderate inflation," positional goods — those very things that determine your place in society — are skyrocketing at a cosmic rate, invisible to the radar of official statistics.
Positional Goods: A Ticket to the Elite Club That Gets More Expensive Every Second
Economist Fred Hirsch introduced the term "positional goods" back in 1976, but his insights are more relevant than ever. The essence is painfully simple: some goods are valuable not in themselves, but because they are scarce. A Harvard diploma is valuable not for the amount of knowledge (you can get that online for free), but because only a few have it. An apartment in London's historic center is valuable not for its square footage, but for its address.
These are zero-sum goods: if someone got a spot at Stanford — someone else didn't. There won't be more land in Monaco, no matter how much money gets printed. And here's the paradox: the more people want to climb the social ladder, the more expensive the rungs become. Demand rises, supply is fixed — the perfect recipe for a price catastrophe.
But try finding this catastrophe in official statistics. Spoiler: you won't.
Harvard for a Million: When Education Becomes a Luxury Good
Let's do the math. In 1980, a year at Harvard cost about $5,000. Today — over $55,000, and that's not counting room, board, textbooks, and other "minor" expenses. The full cost of four years easily exceeds $300,000. The increase — more than 10 times in real terms.
Now open the CPI data for the same period. Official inflation shows roughly a 3.5x increase. Feel the difference? The cost of what actually determines your child's life chances has grown three times faster than the "consumer basket."
And this isn't a unique case. MIT, Stanford, Yale — it's the same picture everywhere. Elite education has turned into a positional arms race: wealthy families spend hundreds of thousands on tutors, prep courses, the "right" extracurricular activities — just so their children have a chance of making it into the coveted 5% acceptance rate.
The middle class? They take out student loans they'll be paying off until retirement. Or they accept that the doors of the social elevator are closed to their children forever. And the poor don't even dream — they figured out the rules of the game long ago.
Prime Real Estate: A Game with a Predetermined Winner
If education is the ticket to the elite club, then property in prime locations is the membership fee you have to pay forever. And it's growing at a terrifying rate.
Manhattan, Mayfair, Monaco, central Moscow — it's the same story everywhere. Over the past 40 years, prices for prestigious real estate have increased 15-20 times, while "average" property has risen 5-7 times. But the CPI "doesn't see" this because it measures the "typical" basket of a "typical" consumer.
The problem is that an address is not just a roof over your head. It's access to the best schools (education again!), safe streets, useful social connections, career opportunities. Living in the "right" neighborhood, your child automatically enters the "right" environment. Living in the "wrong" one — they're automatically excluded.
And here's the irony: central banks, printing money to "save the economy," first inflate the prime real estate market. Freshly printed trillions first reach those who are already wealthy — and they buy what's always in deficit. Land in Kensington won't appear out of thin air. But new dollars will.
Why the Consumer Price Index Is Blind, Deaf, and Mute
This isn't a conspiracy — it's methodology. The CPI was created to measure the cost of basic necessities: food, clothing, transportation, basic housing. It answers the question "how much does it cost not to die," not "how much does it cost to succeed."
Elite universities? Not included in the basket — too few people attend them. Prestigious real estate? Excluded — that's an investment, not consumption. Private schools, membership in exclusive clubs, access to world-class healthcare? Statistically insignificant.
The result is absurd: everything that determines real life chances, everything people are willing to pay any amount for, everything that creates or destroys social mobility — all of this officially "doesn't exist" in the world of inflation statistics.
And when a politician says "inflation is under control," they're technically correct. Bread and milk are rising moderately. But the fact that your children will never be able to afford what you could — that's simply not their problem.
Hidden Inequality: A Ladder with Its Bottom Rungs Kicked Out
Here's what's really happening. Every year, while official inflation shows respectable 3-5%, positional goods are rising 8-12%. The difference seems small? Calculate it over a generation.
Over 25 years at 5% inflation, prices increase 3.4 times. At 10% — 10.8 times. This means each successive generation must be three times wealthier than the previous one — just to have the same chances at social success.
This is "hidden inequality of opportunity." Formally, everyone is equal. Formally, Harvard is open to all. Formally, anyone can buy an apartment in Monaco. In practice, the entry ticket becomes unaffordable for an ever-larger portion of the population, and no statistics capture this.
Wealthy families are protected: their assets — that same prime real estate and investment portfolios — grow along with positional goods inflation. The poor and middle class keep savings in currency that's depreciating. They're running up an escalator that's going down, and every year they have to run faster.
Math Versus Illusions: What Honest Calculations Show
Imagine a typical middle-class family circa 1990. Income — two average salaries. Dream — to give their children quality education and pass on property in a good neighborhood. Realistic? Absolutely.
Now take their grandchildren in 2025. The same two average salaries in real terms. But positional goods have increased in price 5-10 times relative to the average basket. The same dream? Mathematically impossible.
Not because the grandchildren are lazy or stupid. Not because they "eat avocado toast." Because the system is structured so that the social elevator gets more expensive faster than the incomes of those who need it most can grow.
And every time a central bank fires up the printing press "to save the economy," the gap widens. New money flows to those who own assets. And assets are positional goods. The circle closes.
Time to Rethink Capital Protection
What should an ordinary person do in a world where official statistics systematically ignore the real devaluation of their opportunities? Keep money in fiat currency that loses purchasing power not by 3-5%, but by 8-12% annually — if measured in what actually matters?
Historically, the answer was gold — an asset with limited supply. Then came Bitcoin — an attempt to create digital gold. But bitcoin has a problem: it only limited emission without creating a mechanism for actually reducing supply. And it falls together with the entire market — correlation with risk assets makes it a questionable hedge.
What's needed is an asset that's not just limited — but deflationary. One whose quantity decreases over time, like the amount of land in prestigious areas decreases. An asset embedded in a functioning economic ecosystem, not hanging in a vacuum of hopes and speculation.
DeflationCoin: Deflationary Logic for a Deflationary World
DeflationCoin offers what neither fiat currencies nor traditional crypto assets have — algorithmic reverse inflation. The deflationary halving mechanism burns coins not placed in staking, creating a constant reduction in supply. This isn't just emission limitation — it's real deflation, operating on the same logic that makes positional goods so valuable.
Smooth unlocking eliminates sharp crashes, smart staking creates a culture of long-term investing, and a diversified IT ecosystem — from educational gambling to algorithmic trading — creates internal demand for the token. In a world where your social elevator is getting three times more expensive than official inflation, perhaps it's time to pay attention to an asset built on the same principles of scarcity and deficit as the prime real estate of your dreams.