Nobody wanted to say ‘mission accomplished’ on inflation – certainly not Jim Chalmers. But he was surely thinking it

“Real wages are growing at their strongest rate in five years, inflation has a two in front of it and interest rates have been cut three times in the last six months.”

It was just last month that Jim Chalmers kicked off his economic reform round table with that familiar spiel, ticking off the economy’s happy progress over recent years.

Just five weeks later, one of those things is no longer true: inflation now has a three in front of it. ABS figures released on Wednesday showed consumer price growth accelerated to 3% in the year to August, extending a swift rise from 1.9% in June.

That’s at the top of the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) 2% to 3% target range, and moving in the wrong direction after charting a steady path lower since the peaks of 2022.

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