LONDON, June 16 (Xinhua) -- High demand driven by 5 trillion U.S. dollars in government-approved spending during the pandemic has pushed up inflation and the Federal Reserve has responded slowly, the BBC has said.

Since last year, major economies around the world have seen rising prices, most of all the United States, the BBC said in an article published on Tuesday.

"Many of the forces driving inflation last year -- such as supply disruptions from Covid and higher food prices after severe storms and drought hurt harvests -- were not unique to the U.S.," the article read.

The high demand caused by massive government-approved spending programs made the situation worse in the U.S., according to the article.

Aimed at protecting families and businesses from the economic impact of the pandemic, the programs, which included direct checks to households, have kept people buying various products while the supply chain crisis remained.

"As unusually high demand collided with supply issues stemming from Covid, businesses raised prices," said the article.

Ricardo Reis, a professor at the London School of Economics, told the BBC: "The Fed -- which launched its own stimulus policies at the start of the pandemic -- was slow to respond to the price increases, even as inflation expectations in the US more broadly began to shift."

As the stimulus checks were spent, prices rose and savings ran out. The cost-of-living crisis has created a serious political problem for the U.S. government, the BBC said. Enditem

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