More than a year after Americans were told that inflation would be "transitory," several prominent economists now warn that persistently rising prices could be here to stay for a while.
"The history of developed countries since 1970 is very discouraging about the prospects of bringing down 8 percent inflation," tweeted Larry Summers, the Barack Obama advisor who was one of several economists to correctly warn that the American Rescue Plan's spending surge would trigger inflation. If anything, Summers wrote, the current belief that interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve will curtail rising prices while slowing the economy might be overly optimistic.
