The 'Great Inflation' won't be over until the Fed says so and stops hiking interest rates, chief economist says

• Inflation may be cooling but it's soon to declare victory, a chief economist says.
• The threat isn't over until the Fed says so and stops hiking rates, Vincent Reinhart said.
• The Fed may find it harder to keep fighting inflation if unemployment ticks upward, Reinhart warned.

US inflation may have cooled in March, but it's soon to say the threat is officially over, a veteran economist says.

"We can't declare victory yet. The 'Great Inflation' isn't over until the Fed says it is because they don't need to raise rates anymore," Vincent Reinhart, chief economist at Dreyfus & Mellon, told Bloomberg on Thursday. 

"Once we get a run in which inflation is close to goal and people don't care much about inflation, then it's behind us," he added.