An article in The Economist titled “The Tyranny of Differential Calculus: Rates of Change and The Pace of Decay in All Around We See” states, "'Inflation drops by disappointing two points,' cries the billboard, which, roughly translated, means that prices are still rising, but less fast than they were, though not quite as much less fast as everybody had hoped." Explain this passage in terms of function values, first derivatives, and second derivatives.