Inflation
WordNet
noun
(1) The act of filling something with air
(2) Lack of elegance as a consequence of being pompous and puffed up with vanity
(3) (cosmology) a brief exponential expansion of the universe (faster than the speed of light) postulated to have occurred shortly after the big bang
(4) A general and progressive increase in prices
"In inflation everything gets more valuable except money"
WiktionaryText
Etymology
From , from , from , the perfect passive participle of , from + .
Noun
- An act, instance of, or state of expansion or increase in size, especially by injection of a gas.
- The inflation of the balloon took five hours.
- An increase in the general level of prices or in the cost of living.
- A decline in the value of money.
- An increase in the quantity of money. Usually describes the creation of more fiat money or paper tickets by a nation-state. Leads to the devaluation of existing money, and all prices in that money rise. Price increases are a consequence of inflation.
- Undue expansion or increase, as of academic grades.
- An extremely rapid expansion of the universe, theorised to have occurred very shortly after the big bang.