[fleddr]

Honestly, I'm with those people.

Your explanation is fully technically correct, but the subsequent messaging that inflation is zero is a matter of not reading the room.

When an important item dramatically rises in price, this can have a massive impact on people. A dramatic drop in purchasing power or even businesses needing to close. It is impactful.

When the price continues to be high, the impact remains. The pain continues, the problem is not solved. The politically smart messaging is to say "we feel and acknowledge your continued pain, this is what we're going to do about it", not "Good news! Inflation is 0%."

Same with the opportunistic messaging of sometimes using MoM or YoY, whichever number looks better. When MoM inflation in October is 15% and 5% in November, you really shouldn't bring this as good news. The situation still got worse in the real world.

[lupire]

That's a different issue. "High prices" are a problem, but that's not what "inflation" measures. There is no way to report inflation (derivative of prices) that correctly reports "price/wage ratio", which is what people really care about.