The financial systems of many countries found themselves subject to much more regulation, and central banks with more regulatory powers and more explicit mandates for macroeconomic stabilisation, than had previously been the case. Initially, this arrangement held great promise. The instability of the 1930s had apparently been banished. But as time went by, other problems emerged.
This acceleration has been broadly mirrored in the behavior of the core producer price indexes (PPIs) for crude and intermediate materials, probably the best and most comprehensive measures of prices at early stages of processing.