Corporations are people, they wait for either the leading or trailing edge and then pivot. Before we had demand-pull inflation due to constrained supply chains, we are now seeing cost-push inflation, and its not about the pandemic spending as much as the Fed left the money printer on for the past 10 years under QE.

Chicken's come home to roost, and the pandemic happened after the Velocity of Money for the M2 had already dropped to nothing. Giving money to people and paying for their education was a last ditch effort after bank lending stopped in Oct/Nov 2019. The charts are all there for those that watch them.

It’s like a triggered phase change from a super heated or cooled state. Something triggers the start and the state shifts very quickly. In this case the Covid supply shock was the seed.

Things were in steady state. The actual momentary supply and demand shock caused prices to naturally inflate. And when the supply returned they noted that prices didn't go down. Now they were free to test more increases.