Noun: inflation in'fley-shun
- A general and progressive increase in prices
"in inflation everything gets more valuable except money"; "Rising prices led to concerns about inflation in the economy";
- rising prices
- The act of filling something with air
"The inflation of the hot air balloon was a spectacular sight"
- (cosmology) a brief exponential expansion of the universe (faster than the speed of light) postulated to have occurred shortly after the big bang
"Cosmic inflation theory helps explain the uniformity of the early universe"
- Lack of elegance as a consequence of being pompous and puffed up with vanity
"His inflation made him impossible to work with";
- ostentation, ostentatiousness, pomposity, pompousness, pretentiousness, puffiness, splashiness
Derived forms: inflations
Type of: blowup, blow-up, detonation, economic process, enlargement, expansion, explosion, inelegance
Antonym: deflation, disinflation
Encyclopedia: Inflation