“...but we certainly are not going to see pre pandemic prices in awhile.”
I agree. And the only way we would see them is with a severe recession.
The Fed could do something like to continue to tighten our monetary policy. But to do that, it will cause a severe recession similar to the Early 1980s recession. The Biden Administration is unwilling to pay the political price for that so we will continue to see high inflation (with continued deficit spending by the government)
https://advisors.vanguard.com/insights/article/series/market-perspectives#projected-returns
Vanguard Market projections for the next 10 years.
This was published May 15. 2024
Vanguard is the largest mutual fund company in the world. They MAY know something about this subject.