Most people in the advanced economies—including most economists—really don’t have any idea what inflation and hyperinflation is. They don’t have a clue because they haven’t lived through it, or were children when it happened in the States and in Europe during the Seventies.

They think it’s nothing more complicated than a rise in prices that ripples through the economy—like a spectator in a football stadium who stands up, obliging the people sitting behind him to also stand up, so that they too can see the action on the pitch, which in turn forces the people behind them to stand up too, until finally, the whole stadium is up on its feet.