“Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon.” Milton Friedman’s famous dogma looks increasingly quaint today. In the face of unprecedented public debts, yawning budget deficits, and ever-increasing demands on the public purse, the ability of monetary policy to keep a lid on inflation looks an ever more quixotic task. New research reminds investors that it has ever been thus. If inflation is to be tamed, budgetary discipline is always and everywhere the ultimate prerequisite.[....]