Keynes’ citation of Lenin and Buffett’s story explain perfectly why governments love inflation so much and hate gold or, more generally, hard assets. Inflation creates an illusion of unending uptrend in the value of assets. It also allows the state to tax without the people realizing it. If you price something in fiat (paper, electronic) currency, you can certainly believe prices always go up with just minor corrections. But if you price something in real currency such as gold, the picture changes totally. This is the illusion of inflation.