The Federal Reserve announced that it would double its auctions of cash to banks to as much as $900 billion and is considering further steps to unfreeze short-term lending markets as the credit crunch deepens. Meanwhile, lawmakers just passed a $700 billion bill designed to purchase toxic debt from troubled banks. But where does all of this money come from? The printers of course!

Unfortunately, not even printing money is free as many countries like Zimbabwe could tell you. The more money you print, the less the money is worth. Simple supply and demand economics. So, while the US is printing all of this money to bailout the financial sector, the value of the dollar will fall as more of them hit the world markets.

A lower dollar value is good and bad news. The good news is that US goods are cheaper for foreigners, which means that exports tend to rise. This is exactly how China's economy grew so fast. The bad news is that foreign goods and raw materials cost a lot more for US consumers, so everything becomes more expensive - bad news with high unemployment and record debts.

So, how can you avoid these problems. Well, one way is to keep your money in inflation protected securities, known as TIPS. These are government bonds that protect your money against inflation. Another way is to invest in foreign assets that may benefit from the cheap prices or even purchase US assets on the cheap yourself (such as US blue chip stocks).

Unfortunately, food prices are likely to continue rising, but with your money protected, it will cost roughly the same over the long run. Meanwhile, investing in cheap US assets now could pay dividends down the road when the economy recovers.