I agree, I have yet to see hard data on this but academic research tends to shed light on things long after the fact... while a big part of making money is about what is happening right now. Anecdotally I've seen (and you probably have too) that I can buy many of the items I need for daily life for dirt cheap online, and when I need labor for my company I can hire nationally/globally on sites like upwork for a fraction of what local talent would cost. Both have low transaction costs and because of ratings I waste much less time and money buying the wrong thing or hiring the wrong person... which is an aspect of inflation.

That final point is probably worth study. My thesis would be that when the economy is hot everyone is in a hurry and more likely to hire people/vendors and buy things that aren't ideal. Online rating systems tend to direct demand to the vendors who can successfully satisfy that demand. The web also makes discovery of new vendors and products very quick lowering the switching costs.