Judging the balance between those two is, I guess, how we earn our money."But in the Senate estimates hearing on Thursday, Ms Bullock said central banks had learned lessons from the economic problems of the 1970s and it was one of the reasons why they were so concerned about keeping people's inflation expectations under control.She said she did not want Australians to start expecting that inflation was going to be permanently higher, because then they'd start to behave in ways that would make their expectations of high inflation becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy."To the extent that the price of fuel has gone up and it stays there, that's introduced a permanent cost increase to many industries as well, so they will put that into their prices are talking about the possibility that the second-round effects of this [higher inflation] get embedded into people's psyche, and then you end up with inflation expectations adjusting," she said.But Greens senator Nick McKim wanted to know how rising inflation expectations could lead to higher inflation becoming embedded in the economy when workers didn't have the power to keep securing wage increases. "You're not seriously concerned about a wage price spiral here are you?" he asked."Workers basically have to cop whatever they can get now