The M1 money supply increased by ~600% in the last five years, due to no-reserve banking and enormous money printing during covid, and people still act shocked when there's inflation. It's not because of wage growth, it's not because of "late stage capitalism", it's because of basic supply and demand. Nobody wants to address the elephant in the room that all of this is due to the botched response during covid.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M1SL