Commentary  Investors of a certain age will remember the economic difficulties in the United States in the late 1970s.  The malaise of the time led to the use of the term stagflation used to characterize weak or negative economic growth combined with high inflation or high unemployment.  In turn, this led to the use of the statistic called the “misery index” defined as the unemployment rate plus the inflation rate. A high misery index leads to problems for two key reasons.  First, having a large number of people unemployed at a time of rising prices pretty much defines the term miserable for an economy.  Second, the Federal Reserve responds to inflation by raising interest rates which tends to have a cooling effect on the economy.  This can raise the unemployment rate.  So, during stagflation, the Fed is left with the choice of making the cost of living more expensive for …