Fictive Inflation

Inflation has a number of gnarly impacts here in the real world, but its effects extend far beyond that. Namely, an Amount that is Dramatically Shocking (ADS) (ransoms, payoffs, net worths of fabulously rich characters, etc) has to keep pace with the cost of living. Readers will no doubt recall the illustration of this idea in a bit from the first Austin Powers movie - the "one million dollars!" bit (a truly funny one, but sadly so over-quoted that it has been subjected to a sort of lameness-inflation.)

I suspect that the recent bandying about of astronomical amounts of money here in the real world - 700 billion, 35 billion, 1 trillion - will seriously unmoor ADS's (or purported ADS's). In a world of $35 billion bailouts, what's an audacious ransom? How much would a stolen ancient Mayan artifact be worth, and couldn't a scheming evildoer make more money (and more safely) if he just lined up at the TARP trough?

The new big numbers are so unfathomable that ADS's can't merely keep up with inflation - they have to obliterate it. Take the Six Million Dollar Man, which first aired in 1974. 1974's Six Million Dollar Man would cost you... 29 Million Dollars today. Yawn, right? How much would it take to make you tune in? $100 million? Even then, I don't know. The best bet might be to forgo amounts altogether and just go with an adjective like "bionic."