To pose a question to think about: what inflation are we talking about exactly? Short term inflation (usually horizon of less than 18 months) can significantly

To pose a question to think about: what inflation are we talking about exactly? Short term inflation (usually horizon of less than 18 months) can significantly increase due to demand outstripping supply, absolutely. Market efficiency though, should cause rapid normalization and eventually prices will fall due to competition, at least in a healthy functioning market economy (that's another debate). That said, I'm considering what drives long term inflation, which extends beyond an 18 month horizon. We're approaching year 3 of dramatically increasing inflation across the board, and one of the only mechanisms we have at that point is driving up the cost of new money and allowing that to ripple across the economy. So much of our economic system is centrally based around borrowing, whether its cars, homes, business expansion etc. These decisions are in part, driven by cost. When the cost of borrowing is lower, its easier to spend higher sums and drive long term inflation. It also lends people to seek greater and greater returns with "cheap money", driving these boom bust cycles. My general argument is long term inflation is driven by cheap money, and short term inflation that may be caused by government assistance is just that - short term, and measurable, and should, in a functioning market, normalize itself away. tl;dr, demand side inflation naturally curbs since high demand outstripping supply will natural raise prices to an equilibrium, and bring them back down as it cools off, supply side inflation is more opaque in reality, esp. when it comes to controlling borrowing costs (IE, creating new money)