With your chart, I see a direct correlation between throwing away Bretton Woods in 1971 and making the dollar a fiat currency and things going haywire. I will blame Nixon. I am a proud over-simplifier after all.
and, does anyone remember the run-up in interest rates in 1979-80? Iff’en I ‘ember ‘zact’y, t’was about 18 to 21%.
And we had four kids to feed, and were trying to buy our very first house, after years of renting!
Actually, that assessment is pretty close to the mark. Nixon closing the gold window was a major milestone on the path to the present monetary cluster****.