EconoChina

Something interesting from the S. Korean Yonhap news agency: pay raise for N. Korean workers.

True, 5% wage hike isn’t much. But I think it highlights the problem of raging inflation throughout the developing economies. Only a few days ago, garment workers in Bangladesh protested violently over wage demands, despite an 80% pay rise. With soaring food prices, there’s no way to avoid further rises in wages.

What does this mean? First of all, exporters may be less inclined to leave China for other countries, as wages are rising across the board. More importantly, exporters will demand higher prices to compensate their rising costs. While individual exporter may have minimal pricing power in the global market, developing countries on the whole do have the power and inflation will be exported to the developed economies in the form of higher prices for consumer products. Yes, all that mountains of printed money is coming home to roost in the developed economies.

What about all that invincible deflationary force? It will be there too, QE2 or not. It’s just that inflation and deflation will occupy different sectors of the matured economies. A scenario from hell.