Chris Richardson

It's very much a minority one.

But if you think of what we're targeting with inflation, the idea is simply just a little bit of inflation, low on average.

It helps grease the wheels of the economy as it works.

And in a sense, that just gives us a bit of a bumper bar.

You really don't want to have the opposite problem that we have today, where prices are falling instead of rising, and it becomes hard to keep the economy moving because it's hard to have interest rates go below zero.

I think in a world which is more shocking in every sense, the last boring year of your life, Sam, was 2006, and it's been a bit of a white-knuckle ride ever since.

In a world with more shocks...

I'd be quite happy to see a bigger bumper bar instead of an average two and a half percent, maybe three or three and a half percent.

And there would be little, it doesn't do away with the problem, but it might help us smooth some of those problems.

Absolutely.

And to be fair, I think the way we do it is not perfect, but it's probably, you know, those moves in interest rates are probably the best way to fight it.

Okay.

To also be fair, governments prefer it.

You know, as you say, it gives them a fall guy or fall girl, you know, and they sort of pretend it's got nothing to do with us.

And sometimes it doesn't have anything to do with them.

And sometimes it does.

For sure.

And we may want to widen the shoulders a little.

We might...

in particular, want governments to be more aware of an inflation fight or a lack of inflation fight in their decisions.