- increased min wage
- supply chain disruptions
- China lockdowns: less goods on the market -> higher prices
- increased price on commodities and energy
All of this already included into current good prices, so there should be something more to push farther inflation.
When you have a supply shock on raw inputs, it takes time for that to make its way through the economy. Businesses along the way keep inventory, they've locked in forward contracts, they can eat the cost increases to avoid losing market share until they're sure the price increases are persistent. But eventually they realize that everyone else in the industry is facing similar price increases and they'll go out of business if they don't, so they raise their prices too. This eventually propagates down the supply chain as inventory runs out and new contracts are negotiated. The price increases of late 2021 were triggered by the initial shock of March 2020. The Ukraine war & China lockdown shocks of early 2022 aren't going to be seen until about 2024.
By the time businesses have adapted to this round of shocks, we may be dealing with new shocks like a war in Europe or the retirement of baby boomers.
It was the biggest shock: panic lockdowns across the world, not just initial. Chances are that supply chains have been adapted, and current localized lockdowns in China will not make significant damage. But we will see.
Fed was aggressively printing starting 2008, and we didn't observe much inflation, meaning those money didn't go to real economy, but went to some big investment speculations and real estate.