For two years, the entire world has fixated on inflation. Instead of welcoming the revival of discussion over the subject, many economists are bent out of shape. Not at inflation, but at Professor Isabella Weber.

Already in winter 2021, Weber noted in a guest column for the Guardian that many firms were systematically passing along the inflationary pressures of the pandemic to their customers one to one, and some were doing so at an even higher ratio — with profits booming. Normally, central banks combat these pressures by raising interest rates, which dampens aggregate demand in the economy. In concrete terms, this means generating unemployment. Instead of rate hikes, Weber proposed strategic price controls that would be managed by the state. She was grilled for this take, with one Nobel Prize winner labeling her theory “truly stupid.” He later apologized.

Just eighteen months after the publication of her column, all major economic organizations — such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the centrals banks of the United States (the Federal Reserve) and the Eurozone (the European Central Bank) — have published multiple studies addressing Weber’s analysis (often without citing it). Weber herself followed up with two research papers, which marshaled empirical support for her profit-driven theory of inflation. For economist Veronika Grimm, an advisor to the German government, all this is so much flimflam.