(Reuters) – “Transitory” was the Federal Reserve’s favorite word for 2021. However, it looks as though the Federal Reserve will soon throw out the term along with all the holiday leftovers.

The preferred term for this year’s high levels of inflation has been “transitory”, according to the U.S. central banks, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell. This was intended to communicate the belief that the inflation was not triggered by factors like pandemic-related supply chain kinks but rather in the forces that will cause rapid price rises to become established.

The phrase appears to have appeared in Powell’s dictionary as “transient” during his last news conference of 2020. It then became “transitory,” in early 2021, as Powell discussed the possibility of a temporary rise in inflation year-over-year driven by base effects – or the comparison of pandemic-suppressed numbers in the preceding year.

Powell, who was speaking out on March 17th about whether the next wave of inflation could be enough to satisfy the three-part Central Bank test that would determine the likelihood of an increase in interest rates, stated, “I would notice that a transitory hike in inflation above 2.2% as appears likely this year would not meet this benchmark.”

The term was enshrined by April in each Fed two-day policy meeting’s statement. However, some Powell colleagues are now disdainful about its use in recent months.

Powell believes that now is the time for Powell to let the guest out, despite inflation being at its highest point in 30 years and the Fed’s target rate running at at least twice as high for six consecutive months.

When Powell was asked by the U.S. Senate Banking Committee Tuesday about the persistent usage of “transitory”, Powell stated that he believed the term had different meanings for different people. Many people associate it with something short-lived. “It won’t leave an imprint on the future in the form higher inflation,” was what we used it for.

“It’s likely that it’s a good moment to retire the word and attempt to clarify what we mean.