Inflation is as corrosive to investing as it is to the real economy

It is more than two years since high inflation returned to the rich world, and hopes that it will quietly fade are themselves fading. True, prices are rising more slowly than in 2022, when the pace hit 9.1% in America, 10.6% in the euro area and 10.4% globally. But the view that this was just a passing lurch looks ever less plausible. Britain’s rate has been stuck at 8.7% for two months. American “core” prices, which exclude volatile food and energy, are 5.3% higher than a year ago, a rate that has barely fallen for the past six months.