Yes, it is too bad that our previously benevolent corporations all decided to end that benevolence in the year 2021 and gouge prices.
> crash the economy for his buddies on Wall Street
Of course, exactly what Wall Street wants.
The theory is that corporations will price at the highest price the market will bear and know that price from price tests they are willing to perform. "Inflation in the air" gave them all an impetus to more aggressively explore the space of prices consumers would bear, and it turns out, people who eat chips mostly won't stop buying them when they're 1.5x the price and the packaged weight is cut by 25% over a 2 year period -- and the same follows for a huge number of similar goods.
This is an acceleration of processes that were already under way, but it's also likely enabled by, likely not directly caused by, and likely feeding into "inflation", and it's likely not something that rate changes will directly impact -- though, maybe a second order change, e.g. a crash to the economy, could hurt workers to such a degree that they simply cannot possibly both buy chips and live. That might finally curb price hikes and would indirectly have fought inflation.
Your theory around sticky prices doesn't explain firms running out of things despite keeping increasing inventory.
Certainly, prices can be sticky and may be less sticky during the pandemic but firms still have to compete with each other on cost.
Yes, during periods of extremely high demand relative to current supply, profit for suppliers increases. This encourages new entrants to the market who can help boost supply.
This is just the basic functioning of the economy and price signals in action. If producing things in short supply weren't profitable, that short supply wouldn't get resolved.
In the case of gas, supply issues predominate, although it is worth noting that price of gas going up and number of miles staying the same indicates both supply and demand shocks at the same time.
The Fed has almost perfect control of aggregate demand. Inflation is more challenging because it bakes in expectations.