一个多世纪以来，美国人不断为食品价格上演“国民剧场”：1916年36.5美分一打鸡蛋引发抵制，1970年代鸡蛋逼近80美分、牛肉突破每磅1美元，今天则是抖音上13美元汉堡、12美元卷饼和5美元一打鸡蛋的抱怨。讽刺的是，在政客提出2000美元支票、50年按揭、房租冻结等方案之际，杂货年通胀约2.5%、租金低于3.5%，且自2019年以来，普通工人的小时工资涨幅已超过房租、食品和总体通胀。

尽管如此，消费者信心仍接近历史最低，仅略好于2022年通胀高峰期，主因是“货币幻觉”让人盯着名义数字而非实际购买力。实验显示，人们觉得名义上减薪7%且无通胀比在12%通胀下名义加薪5%更不公平，又更愿意在25%通胀下获得23%名义收益卖房，而不是在25%通缩下承受23%名义损失，即便后者在实际价值上更好，说明旧价格锚定严重扭曲判断。

在此背景下，增加供给的“丰裕议程”和部分取消关税等方案即便奏效，也难改变名义价格几乎从不下跌的事实，除非通过衰退和通缩。法国1960年通过“重法郎”砍掉两个零，墨西哥1993年以1,000比1推出新比索，波兰1995年以10,000比1改币，甚至1999年引入欧元时仅数字变化就让德国人感觉物价大涨，因此有人提议给美元“去掉一个零”，让如今威廉斯堡4,000美元、未来可能8,000至32,000美元的月租在账面上不再显得如此骇人。

For over a century Americans have turned food prices into national theater, from 36.5-cent eggs in 1916 and 80-cent eggs with $1-per-pound beef in the 1970s to today’s $13 burgers, $12 burritos, and $5-a-dozen eggs on TikTok. Ironically, while politicians offer $2,000 stimulus checks, 50-year mortgages, rent freezes, and public groceries, annual grocery inflation sits near 2.5%, rent inflation under 3.5%, and since 2019 hourly pay for non-supervisory workers has risen faster than rents, food, and overall inflation.

Yet consumer sentiment hovers near record lows, rivaled only by the 2022 inflation spike, largely because of “money illusion,” the tendency to focus on nominal figures rather than real purchasing power. Behavioral studies show workers deem a 7% nominal wage cut with 0% inflation more unfair than a 5% nominal raise with 12% inflation, and home sellers prefer a 23% nominal gain after 25% inflation to a 23% nominal loss after 25% deflation, even though the latter leaves them better off in real terms, revealing how strongly people anchor on old price tags.

Against this backdrop, abundance policies to boost childcare, energy, and housing supply and Trump’s idea of trimming his own tariffs cannot change the near-irreversibility of high nominal prices without recession and deflation. Historical redenominations—France’s 1960 heavy franc cutting two zeros, Mexico’s 1993 nuevo peso at 1,000 to 1, Poland’s 1995 change at 10,000 to 1, and even the euro’s 1999 digit shift that made Germans feel prices had jumped—suggest a “new dollar” that knocks a zero off could make today’s $4,000 Williamsburg rent, and tomorrow’s $8,000, $16,000, or $32,000, look less outrageous while leaving real costs untouched.