system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Why doesn’t a strong USD cancel out inflation?

I live in Japan. Right now the yen is really weak, so you’d think things would be really expensive. But they’re not. There’s been minimal inflation.

Meanwhile, over in the US the dollar is super strong right now. Which should make things cheaper… but they’re not. There’s massive inflation.

These two forces are literally reinforcing each other and making prices completely out of sync between countries. Before in Jan 2020 a Big Mac was $4.82 in the US and 390¥ / $3.55 in Japan. Now a Big Mac is $5.15 in the US (7% inflation) and still 390¥ in Japan (0% inflation), but converted to USD, now only $2.83 because of the weak yen.

Why is inflation and currency value both pushing in the same direction rather than cancelling each other out?
gpt
It's complicated. There are several factors. I'll talk about the US:

1\. A lot of inflation was caused by the easy-money policies of the Fed in 2021. That creates domestic inflation which is not easily compensated for by cheaper imports.

2\. In the US imports only make up ~13% of GDP. Then you have to remember that the USD has not risen so much. The dollar index is up ~11% comparing the start of the year to today. So, at the most an 11% reduction in 13% of purchases. Not enough to make much of a difference.

3\. Many goods that the US buys in dollars are priced in dollars anyway.

For Japan see the reply by 12chihuahuasyapping.