{"id":1484634,"date":"2024-08-19T21:40:00","date_gmt":"2024-08-20T01:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1484634"},"modified":"2024-08-19T21:40:00","modified_gmt":"2024-08-20T01:40:00","slug":"forty-centuries-of-failure-price-controls-debasement-tyranny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/forty-centuries-of-failure-price-controls-debasement-tyranny\/1484634\/","title":{"rendered":"Forty Centuries Of Failure: Price Controls, Debasement, & Tyranny"},"content":{"rendered":"

Forty Centuries Of Failure: Price Controls, Debasement, & Tyranny<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Authored by Mark Jeftovic via BombThrower.com,<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

It hasn\u2019t worked\u00a0once,<\/em>\u00a0so why would a politician go all-in on price controls now?<\/h2>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

August 15th was the anniversary of the infamous \u201cNixon Shock\u201d, when excessive spending and trade deficits had governments on the ropes, as prices climbed relentlessly, inflation soared into the double digits, while economic growth stalled.<\/p>\n

In 1971 of that year, Nixon \u201ctemporarily\u201d suspended convertibility of the US dollar for gold (still in effect), while simultaneously proclaiming a 90-day freeze on all wages and prices across the United States.<\/p>\n

The stagflationary 70\u2019s also saw Trudeau the 1st enact \u201cThe Anti-Inflation Act of 1975\u201d, with his infamous \u201c6 and 5\u201d measures (a 6% cap on wage increases with a 5% cap on prices was supposed to put 1% back into the pocket of the peasants).<\/p>\n

None of this worked, and as the lumpenpublic were mulched by higher prices and growing government, gold served as a barometer to it all \u2013 soaring from $35\/oz at the time of the Nixon Shock to $850\/oz in 1980 (that all-time high still won\u2019t be exceeded in inflation adjusted terms\u00a0until gold cracks about $2,580<\/a>).<\/p>\n

It took Paul Volcker\u00a0 to get inflation under control with double-digit interest rates \u2013 (when the news came that he had been elevated from President of the New York Fed under Gerald Ford to Chairman by Jimmy Carter, Volcker\u2019s wife burst into tears).<\/p>\n

Today, 50 years later with a monetary regime that makes the 70\u2019s look austere, double-digit interest rates are simply not an option \u2013 we\u2019ve just seen a 5-sigma event nearly blow up the global monetary system from the BoJ nudging interest rates from the zero bound to 25bps.<\/p>\n

With an unprecedented levels of monetary expansion and debt levels somewhere beyond nosebleed elevations, policy-makers and central bankers are trapped.<\/p>\n

This is why we\u2019re seeing a resurgence in popular rhetoric around the idea of\u00a0price controls<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 everywhere from Jagmeet Singh here in Canada, who blames grocery store CEOs for inflation, to Dem nominee\u00a0and incumbent Vice President<\/em>\u00a0Kamala Harris, channeling him with promises of food price controls as part of her election campaign.<\/p>\n

Price Controls Invariably Presage Decline (& Tyranny)<\/h2>\n

The definitive chronicle of price controls throughout recorded history comes to us by way of Robert L. Schuettinger and Eammon F. Butler\u2019s \u201cForty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls<\/a>\u201d \u2013 or \u201cHow\u00a0Not<\/em>\u00a0to Fight Inflation<\/strong>\u201c.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

I could not for the life of me find my hard copy, but during the depths of the Global Financial Crisis, The Mises Institute\u00a0saw the value in republishing it<\/a>\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cBy special arrangement with the authors, the Mises Institute is thrilled to bring back this popular guide to ridiculous economic policy from the ancient world to modern times. This outstanding history illustrates the utter futility of fighting the market process through legislation. It always uses despotic measures to yield socially catastrophic results.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

It starts as far back as Urakagina of Lagash, a King of Sumeria in around 2350BC who came to power and\u00a0overturned<\/em>\u00a0wage and price controls held in place by an unnamed line of despotic predecessors:<\/p>\n

\u201c[he]began his rule by ending the burdens of excessive government regulations over the economy, including controls on wages and prices\u2026<\/em>
An historian of this period tells us that from Urakagina,<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018we have one of the most precious and revealing documents in the history of man and his perennial and unrelenting struggle for freedom from tyranny and oppression.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

This document records\u00a0a sweeping reform of a whole series of prevalent abuses<\/strong>, most of which could be\u00a0traced to a ubiquitous and obnoxious bureaucracy<\/strong>\u00a0\u2026it is\u00a0in this document that we find the word \u2018freedom\u2019 used for the first time in man\u2019s recorded history; the word is \u2018amargi\u2019.<\/strong>\u201c<\/em><\/p>\n

It is somewhat telling to find that the word \u201cfreedom\u201d was seemingly coined to describe the end of price controls.<\/p>\n

The Code of Hammurabi\u00a0<\/strong>of ancient Babylon is often cited as one of the earliest legal codes, thought to be the first to enshrine the presumption of innocence, but it also contained detailed tables of price controls on everything from goods to services \u2013 like the hiring of a wagon (\u201cforty qa of corn per diem\u201d) to the wages of a field laborer (\u201ceight gur of corn per annum\u201d).<\/p>\n

According to Schuettinger and Butler, historical records show that Hammurabi\u2019s price controls dampened trade and economic activity for both Hammurabi and his successors, citing W. F Leemans, who found that:<\/p>\n

Prominent and wealthy tamkaru (merchants) were no longer found in Hammurabi\u2019s reign. Moreover, only a few tamkaru are known from Hammurabi\u2019s time and afterwards . . . all . . . evidently minor tradesmen and money-lenders.<\/em><\/p>\n

Concluding:<\/p>\n

\u201cit appears that the very people who were supposed to benefit from the Hammurabi wage and price restrictions were driven out of the market by those and other statutes.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Finding that:<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a remarkable change in the fortunes of the people of Nippur and Isin and the other ancient towns which he ruled<\/strong>, which came in the middle of Rim-Sin\u2019s reign [Hammurbi\u2019s predecessor \u2013 whose policies he extended] .\u00a0The beginning of the economic decline corresponds exactly with a series of \u201creforms\u201d inaugurated by him<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

For the first of many times throughout this piece, I will ask the reader to \u201chold that thought\u201d.<\/p>\n

We can fast forward to ancient Greece where Athens, a city state \u201cperpetually short on grain\u201d sought to control the prices at which it was sold in order to keep them \u201cjust\u201d. At one point, under a measure that was supposed to be\u00a0temporary<\/em>\u00a0(sound familiar?), state appointed corn buyers called \u201cSitonai\u201d were mobilized to set the pricing.<\/p>\n

Predictably, the problem got worse, and there were calls to make the measures permanent.\u00a0 One politician, Lysian of Athens wanted to put grain dealers who broke the code\u00a0to death.<\/em><\/p>\n

The book is exhaustive in its examinations, covering China, India, the Medieval age, even modern times (Canada and the US in the seventies) \u2013 but ancient\u00a0Rome\u00a0<\/em>warrants a deeper look \u2013 particularly the road to Emperor Diocletian\u2019s Edict of 301AD.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder the tribune Caius Gracchus the Lex Sempronia Frumentaria was adopted which allowed every Roman citizen the right to buy a certain amount of wheat at an official price much lower than the market price.<\/em><\/p>\n

In 58 B.C. this law was \u201cimproved\u201d to allow every citizen free wheat.<\/strong>\u00a0The result, of course, came as a surprise to the government.<\/em><\/p>\n

Most of the farmers remaining in the countryside simply left to live in Rome without working.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

If that wasn\u2019t enough:<\/p>\n

Slaves were freed by their masters so that they, as Roman citizens, could be supported by the state.<\/em><\/p>\n

(There is a modern day analog here with open borders and the illegal immigration crisis \u2013 where we could be looking at mass migrations as being, at least partially, incentivized by governments of weakening economies trying to jettison dependents and potential rebels \u2013 offloading them to countries dumb enough to think they\u2019re acting enlightened by taking them on and supporting them).<\/em><\/p>\n

By 45BC, Julius Caesar found that roughly a third of the citizenry was living on \u201cfree food\u201d from the government.<\/p>\n

He managed to reduce this number by about half, but it soon rose again; throughout the centuries of the empire Rome was to be perpetually plagued with this problem of artificially low prices for grain, which caused economic dislocations of all sorts.<\/em><\/p>\n

Succeeding emperors resorted to the ancient version of \u201cQuantitative Easing\u201d \u2013 currency debasement:<\/p>\n

In order to attempt to deal with their increasing economic problems, the emperors gradually began to devalue the currency. Nero (A.D. 54\u201368) began with small devaluations and matters became worse under Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 161\u201380) when the weights of coins were reduced. \u201cThese manipulations were the probable cause of a rise in prices,\u201d according to Levy. The Emperor Commodus (A.D.)<\/em><\/p>\n

By Diocletian\u2019s time in the 4th century it reached truly hyper-inflationary levels when measured in other provincial currencies:<\/p>\n

Egypt was the province of the Empire most affected, but her experience was reflected in lesser degrees throughout the Roman world. During the fourth century,\u00a0the value of the gold solidus changed from 4,000 to 180 million Egyptian drachmai.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Diocletian\u2019s Dilemma<\/h2>\n

Gresham\u2019s Law states that \u201cbad money drives out the good\u201d \u2013 it means that rapidly devaluing or debased currencies are traded for anything\u00a0other\u00a0<\/em>than themselves (which drives prices denominated in that currency up) \u2013 while \u201csound\u201d currencies, like gold, or nowadays\u00a0Bitcoin<\/em>\u00a0are hoarded \u2013 or at least more carefully spent.<\/p>\n

\u201c[I]n the years before Diocletian, emperors were issuing tin-plated copper coins which were still called by the name \u2018denarius.\u2019 Gresham\u2019s Law, of course, became operative; silver and gold coins were naturally hoarded and were no longer found in circulation.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The result of iterative generations of government mismanagement and currency debasement was the hollowing out of the middle class:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe middle class was almost obliterated and the proletariat was quickly sinking to the level of serfdom. Intellectually the world had fallen into an apathy from which nothing would rouse it.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The same thing is happening today, but in Diocletian\u2019s time, he saw what was happening and moved to impose some kind of order, first by issuing a new Denarious, that after centuries of declining silver content, openly contained none:<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Via\u00a0Armstrong Economics<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2026and then, moving to a system that attempted to replace money entirely (again, hold that thought):<\/p>\n

Since money was completely worthless, he devised a system of taxes based on payments in kind. This system had the effect, via the\u00a0ascripti glebae\u00a0<\/strong>[tenant serfs], of totally destroying the freedom of the lower classes\u2014they became serfs and were bound to the soil to ensure that the taxes would be forthcoming.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

But he had a dilemma:<\/p>\n

The principal reason for the official overvaluation of the currency, of course, was to provide the wherewithal to support the large army and\u00a0massive bureaucracy\u2014the equivalent of modern government<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Diocletian\u2019s choices were to\u00a0continue to mint the increasingly worthless denarius or to cut \u201cgovernment expenditures\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0and thereby reduce the requirement for minting them.<\/em><\/p>\n

In modern terminology, he could either continue to \u201cinflate\u201d or he could begin the process of \u201cdeflating\u201d the economy.<\/em><\/p>\n

Diocletian decided that deflation, reducing the costs of civil and military government, was impossible. On the other hand: To inflate would be equally disastrous in the long run.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Diocletian\u2019s problem is the\u00a0same\u00a0<\/em>one central banks and policy makers face today, all over the world:<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Source:\u00a0IMF<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The world is awash in too much debt \u2013 with debt-to-GDP more than doubling from 100% to over 256% since the Nixon Shock. With interest rates being artificially suppressed for decades \u2013 austerity is off the table, for now \u2014 I\u2019ve been writing for years how\u00a0CBDCs and #Netzero are essentially setting the table for forced austerity<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But we\u2019re not there yet \u2013 retail CBDCs are a few years away from being ready\u00a0but the global financial system is unravelling\u00a0now (in the meantime,\u00a0you can get on the waiting list<\/a>\u00a0for my CBDC Survival Guide, which is coming out this fall).<\/em><\/p>\n

How did Diocletian navigate the quagmire?<\/p>\n

The Solution: Inflate with Price Controls<\/h2>\n

As Schuettinger and Butler recount,<\/p>\n

It was in this seemingly desperate circumstance that Diocletian determined to continue to inflate, but to do so in a way that would, he thought, prevent the inflation from occurring.<\/em><\/p>\n

He sought to do this by\u00a0simultaneously fixing the prices of goods and services<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0suspending the freedom of people to decide what the official currency was worth<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Contrary to our own political leaders,\u00a0 Diocletian wasn\u2019t stupid (in fact, he may have been the most intelligent Roman Emperor after a long string of weak minded half-wits who were propped up by the military).<\/p>\n

He knew that the incentives would be against the productive class working, selling, and entrenpreneuring at a loss and he understood that\u00a0Incentives Are\u00a0Everything.<\/em><\/a>\u00a0In his case:<\/p>\n

\u201cif farmers, merchants and craftsmen could not expect to receive what they considered to be a fair price for their goods they would not put them on the market at all, but would await a change in the law (or in the dynasty).\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

So Diocletian had to realign people\u2019s incentives:<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom such guilt also he too shall not be considered free, who, having goods necessary for food or usage, shall after this regulation have thought that they might be withdrawn from the market; since the penalty ought to be even heavier for him who causes need than for him who makes use of it contrary to the statutes.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The penalty was \u2026death.<\/p>\n

Same for anyone who purchased goods or services at prices above the prescribed amount (no matter how hungry or desperately you needed something or how scarce that something was).<\/p>\n

As draconian as that sounds, it almost looks like more people were killed by deprivation and mob rule than were executed for violating price controls:<\/p>\n

There was much blood shed upon very slight and trifling accounts; and the people brought provisions no more to markets, since they could not get a reasonable price for them and this increased the dearth so much, that at last after many had died by it\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The authors go on to cite Roland Kent:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn other words, the price limits set in the Edict were not observed by the traders, in spite of the death penalty provided in the statute for its violation; would-be purchasers, finding that the prices were above the legal limit,\u00a0formed mobs and wrecked the offending traders\u2019 establishments, incidentally killing the traders<\/strong>, though the goods were after all of but trifling value; hoarded their goods against the day when the restrictions should be removed, and the resulting scarcity of wares actually offered for sale caused an even greater increase in prices, so that what trading went on was at illegal prices, and therefore performed clandestinely.<\/em><\/p>\n

Within four years, the law was set aside, and Diocletian abdicated.<\/p>\n

Michael Rostovtzeff, another leading Roman historian, remarked:<\/p>\n

\u201cDiocletian shared the pernicious belief of the ancient world in the omnipotence of the state, a belief which many modern theorists continue to share with him and with it.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Here We Are Again<\/h2>\n

Since the unprecedented monetary stimulus during Covid, we are now beginning to see exactly how trapped we are \u2013 with politicians taking victory laps for 2.9% inflation (hedonically adjusted and perpetually revised) \u2013 nobody is really remarking that the official targeted inflation rate is in the process of being hiked\u00a0by half<\/em>\u00a0from 2% to 3% target.<\/p>\n

The Fed is getting ready to cut interest rates, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England and the ECB are already cutting and as I told readers in the latest issue\u00a0of The Bitcoin Capitalist<\/a>, the Bank of Japan just showed the world\u00a0that they can\u2019t raise:<\/em><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, August 6th, the Bank of Japan and the Ministry of Finance held an emergency meeting, and the next day announced \u201cno more rate hikes\u201d until the global financial system could handle it.<\/em><\/p>\n

Which will be\u00a0never.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

For the first 50 years of the post-Bretton Woods era, since the Nixon Shock, monetary debasement has been mostly under-the-radar and after the stagflationary 70\u2019s, had been largely confined to asset inflation.<\/p>\n

This was thanks to a massive bond super-cycle that saw the cost-of-capital come down for 50 years, igniting an asset bubble on the other side of the ledger:<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Consumer inflation never really started hitting hard until the aftermath of Covid, and the central banks took to hiking rates to try and get it back under control (my suspicion was always that what they really wanted to do was reload as high as possible so they could\u00a0cut<\/em>, once again):<\/p>\n

Again, from this month\u2019s TBC (see end of this post for a trial deal):<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve been saying since the Fed originally started hiking, that they would do so until something broke.<\/p>\n

In March of 2023, something broke \u2013 with Silicon Valley Bank and the regional banking crisis; it was quickly papered over with FDIC backstops on all deposits, while the Fed abandoned their balance sheet reductions and quickly reinflated the money supply.<\/em><\/p>\n

Everything since then has been a theatrical, slow-motion pivot.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now, after this Bank of Japan miscalculation, something really broke \u2013 and the world now sees how the BoJ is trapped, the rest of the central banks are paused or already cutting, right when the global liquidity cycle is starting to turn back up.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Via\u00a0RBC Global Asset Management<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

(Also \u2013\u00a0M2 is also beginning to rise again<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

Price Controls Are The \u2018Hail Mary\u2019 Play of a Bankrupt System<\/h2>\n

All the usual tricks which got us this far, money printing, interest rate suppression, ballooning debt have finally run out of runway because they are now resulting in. consumer price inflation.<\/p>\n

This is 100% the fault of bad political leadership and central bank policy<\/em>\u00a0but that will never be admitted.<\/p>\n

Instead, politicians will resort ad hominem attacks on the productive class, and absurd accusations that it is the fault of investors and entrepreneurs, who must\u00a0navigate the risks of monetary debasement,<\/em>\u00a0for\u00a0causing it.<\/em><\/p>\n

Hence, we have Kamala Harris seemingly anchoring her political campaign on \u201cending price gouging\u201d once she\u2019s in office.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

She seems to be channeling Canada\u2019s own champagne socialist, Jagmeet Singh,\u00a0the Rolex wearing<\/a>,\u00a0Versace sporting<\/a>\u00a0millionaire\u00a0\u00a0who routinely demonizes CEOs<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 particularly those of grocery store chains, for causing inflation:<\/p>\n

Corporate greed<\/strong>\u00a0in our country has reached a breaking point after decades of Liberal and Conservative governments that have rewritten the rules to favour the ultra-rich.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now, every bill you pay makes CEOs richer.<\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s wrong.<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll change the rules<\/strong>\u00a0to help you, not CEO profits.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

(What\u2019s ironic in both cases, is Harris is promising to do something upon being elected, although she\u2019s the incumbent Vice President since 2020, while Jagmeet Singh is the one person in Canada, who is single-handedly propping the Trudeau government in power with a coalition government that he could end at any time).<\/p>\n

The Lure of Technocracy For Price Controls<\/h2>\n

After one looks at the historical record \u2013 4,000 years of endless failures, in price controls, communism and every permutation of centrally planned economies, there has to be a reason politicians are still reaching for it as a solution to problems\u00a0they have caused<\/em>\u00a0and why a small \u2013 but vocal and influential, segment of the public cheerleads this as a net benefit for society.<\/p>\n

The secret sauce of \u201cit\u2019s different this time\u201d is technology \u2013 particularly Big Tech, big platforms, Total Information Awareness and surveillance. Central planners think it is now technically feasible to run all the calculations and tracking in real time that would enable unrestrained monetary stimulus while keeping a lid on negative externalities like inflation.<\/p>\n

Politicians like Kamala Harris and Jagmeet Singh are just farming public sentiment created by their own policy failures, but there are very serious people \u2013 mostly unelected technocrats of a particular globalist mindset, who think we have the means, motive and opportunity to create a kind of \u201cfully automated luxury communism\u201d.<\/p>\n

One of my go-to clips for illustrating the mindset is J Michael Evans at a WEF meeting talking about\u00a0coming personal carbon trackers<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Alibaba Group president J. Michael Evans boasts at the World Economic Forum about the development of an “individual carbon footprint tracker” to monitor what you buy, what you eat, and where\/how you travel. pic.twitter.com\/sisSrUngDI<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Andrew Lawton (@AndrewLawton) May 24, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll lay out the quote again here:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are developing, through technology, an ability for consumers to measure their own carbon footprint. What does that mean? That\u2019s where are they travelling, how are they traveling? What are they eating? What are they consuming on the platform? So, individual \u2013 carbon \u2013 footprint \u2013 tracker. Stay tuned, we don\u2019t have it operational yet, but it\u2019s something we\u2019re working on\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The stage is set, when politicians tell you they want to be able to control prices,\u00a0believe them<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 but what the public\u00a0must\u00a0<\/em>understand is that price controls means\u00a0spending controls<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The politicians will tell you that it\u2019s all about putting \u201cgreedy CEOs\u201d in their place.<\/p>\n

What they won\u2019t tell you is that price controls\u00a0also<\/em>\u00a0means is telling\u00a0\u00a0you<\/em>\u00a0what you\u00a0can<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0cannot<\/em>\u00a0eat, how\u00a0you<\/em>\u00a0use\u00a0energy<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 whether\u00a0you\u2019ll be permitted to travel<\/a>, or make any other kind of economic decision or make any kind of value exchange that you used to take for granted.<\/p>\n

In a world of price controls,\u00a0that\u2019s over<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Throughout history, price controls have always brought about serfdom and tyranny because that is the only way to override individual incentives. In today\u2019s highly wired world that would mean total technocratic feudalism.<\/p>\n

The most vivid example we have today is Venezuela \u2013 where price controls were so effective, the rabble had to break into public zoos to eat the animals.<\/p>\n

*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

Sign up for\u00a0the Bombthrower Mailing List<\/a>\u00a0and get\u00a0The CBDC Survival Guide<\/a>\u00a0when it drops this fall (you\u2019ll also get a copy of\u00a0The Crypto Capitalist Manifesto\u00a0while you wait).\u00a0 Follow me\u00a0on Twitter<\/a>, or\u00a0Nostr<\/a>. You should also\u00a0try The Bitcoin Capitalist for one month here \u00bb<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nMon, 08\/19\/2024 – 17:40<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/political\/forty-centuries-failure-price-controls-debasement-tyranny<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Forty Centuries Of Failure: Price Controls, Debasement, & Tyranny Authored by Mark Jeftovic via BombThrower.com, It hasn\u2019t worked\u00a0once,\u00a0so why would a politician go all-in on…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1484635,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1484634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbimBl-6edI","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2024\/08\/Diocletians_Edict-768x434-IkD11B.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1484634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1484634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1484634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1484635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1484634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1484634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1484634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}