Why can’t the government just set a concrete price for everything (Rent, groceries, etc) and forbid it from ever changing? That would prevent inflation from ever happening, right?

Question

Why can’t the government just set a concrete price for everything (Rent, groceries, etc) and forbid it from ever changing? That would prevent inflation from ever happening, right?

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Answer 1

I have a feeling if the federal government attempted to do that it would in some way subvert federalism and dual sovereignty. Arguably, one could argue this was in some way tied to the power congress has under the commerce clause but it would still be incredibly difficult and there would be several constitutional hoops they would have to jump through when writing it.