The Post-Pandemic Inflation Debate: A Critical Review

This article was published by PSL Quarterly Review

Abstract

This article provides a critical review of the post-pandemic inflation debate. The first part structures the debate through the classification of the arguments into two broad categories (the neoclassical view and the critical political economy view) along with several subcategories. The classification is informed by the positions assumed by debate participants regarding the origin and propagation mechanisms of inflation, together with the economic policy solutions advanced to face the current inflationary episode. The second part is focused on showing that the hegemony of contractionary monetary policy as a policy response to address contemporary inflation is based on weak foundations, whose theoretical and empirical arguments have been consistently and convincingly disputed in critical political economy circles over the last decades.