I don’t know about “mass hysteria” but this inflation has certainly made me purchase less physical stuff and especially less services, I guess I’m not the only one. Generally speaking a sudden decrease in buying is cause for a recession, unless you go the Keynesian way and make the Government make up for the lost demand, but I have a feeling that most of the governments are out of “good” money to throw at that.

I do live in Europe and not in the States, though, maybe things are different there.