Back in March, the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, revealed National Insurance contributions will rise to 13.25pc this April, so even a basic rate taxpayer, earning as little as £25,000 a year, will pay a marginal tax rate of no less than 33.25pc. 

And while the basic and higher income tax rates of 20pc and 40pc will stay put for now, the tax-free and higher rate earnings thresholds have been frozen until 2026. As inflation rises, more and more people and income will be brought into the tax net by stealth, a process economists call “fiscal drag”.

Just as these tax rises bite, utility bills are set to soar again. Already, heating and energy costs have risen sharply over recent months, driven by spiralling wholesale gas prices and the failure of many of the cheapest suppliers. While households have been partly shielded by the energy price cap, that cap shifted upward a few months ago and, in April, is set to rise once more.

Firms, meanwhile, get no price cap protection. That’s why rising energy bills are pushing up costs across a range of companies, from manufacturers to the service sector, including restaurants and pubs.

When firms’ input costs look set to keep rising, they increase consumer prices in anticipation, so they don’t lose out. Such self-fulfilling “supply chain” price pressures are now rife, with producer price inflation – the cost of good leaving UK factories – up at 9.1pc in November. Input price inflation, meanwhile, the cost of raw materials and other basic components, soared to no less than 14.1pc.

High inflation, then, not only hits consumers, but rattles firms too, so they often stop investing, which affects jobs and growth. That results in the ghastly combination of inflation plus economic stagnation, or “stagflation”, another phrase evoking the 1970s.

Today’s inflation in part reflects lockdown, as previously shuttered producers struggle to get back up to speed. But that doesn’t mean it will be short-lived. Global shipping problems, and shortages of semi-conductors and other components, coupled with endemic skills shortages, are generating sustained price pressures – that will take months, possibly years, to dissipate.

Back in the 1970s, trade unions were often militant and covered over half the workforce, compared to less than a quarter now. In lockdown, though, medical and teaching unions have become increasingly strident.

Over the past year, millions of patients have been denied in-person appointments – leaving countless life-threatening conditions undiagnosed. As the full horror of the record five million-plus NHS waiting list becomes apparent, doctors’ unions are still resisting a return to face-to-face normality.

Some teaching unions, too, hooked on zero-Covid zealotry and determined to shame the government, may yet wreck a third successive school year. If such trends persist, today’s white-collar union militants could cause just as much public outrage as their 1970s blue-collared counterparts.

So the next couple of months could well bring an intensifying cost-of-living crisis, combined with trade union intransigence. If that happens, expect countless “winter of discontent” headlines – and a convulsion of domestic politics.

Follow Liam on Twitter: @liamhalligan