Watch any sport nowadays and you will be treated to instant replays that give you a detailed — often slow-motion — view of important moments. Watch the news and you may find yourself feeling like you are similarly watching the past on playback.
But these replays — of high inflation, soaring public debt, a brutal ground war in Europe, a new cold war and the rise of potentially destructive technologies — are far from instant and the stakes are much higher.
Readers might recall that I predicted rising inflation and slower growth as early as spring 2021. Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers did so even earlier. Yet today’s inflation — the worst since the early 1980s — caught most people by surprise.