Just in time for Halloween, the Reserve Bank and Treasurer Jim Chalmers have been delivered an inflation nightmare.

And, like any nightmare, what is scary is in the eye of the beholder.

For Chalmers, the blood-curdling questions range from the government’s economic policy agenda to the political imperative of ensuring cost-of-living pressures remain in check. For the Reserve, the terrifying issue is how it will deal with a trade-off between bringing inflation under control and jobs.

The September quarter inflation results , no matter your political poison, were poor.

Headline inflation – the rate most people experience every day – climbed back over 3 per cent due to the largest quarterly jump in prices in two-and-a-half years.

Part of it was due to the end of electricity subsidies.

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