The rich world faces a painful bout of inflation

Just about everywhere you look in the rich world, government finances are in ruins. France, as its debt mounts, is getting through prime ministers faster than Versailles went through wigs; on October 14th Sébastien Lecornu, the latest, proposed delaying an increase to the retirement age that was meant to restore sanity to the budget. In Japan both rival candidates for prime minister want to splash out, despite their country’s vast debts. Britain faces big tax rises to plug a hole in its budget, after welfare reforms were mostly abandoned—and despite a supposed once-and-for-all tax rise last year. Looming over everything is America’s unsustainable deficit of 6% of GDP, which President Donald Trump muses about adding to with yet more tax cuts.