Small is beautiful, they say, and the revised tier system guiding Oahu’s pandemic restrictions is smaller.

The city website (www.oneoahu.org/reopeningstrategy) now shows only Tiers 4 and 5 — the latter being the newest addition, triggered when the state reaches 60% vaccinated. The final segment: breakthrough. “No more tiers … no restrictions” are the triumphant words on the right, beyond Tier 5.

Also: no going back. The old tier chart, which covered backsliding to a lower tier, is gone. It is good to face forward.

Oahu gets even more expensive

That pinch on the pocketbook lately? It’s inflation, due to price hikes on Oahu’s cost-of-living items, ranging from food to housing to transportation.

In the last 12 months through May, costs of goods and services in Honolulu rose 3.8%, led by higher prices of gasoline and used cars. That’s still below the national inflation rate of 5% — but residents know that things here already tend to be more expensive, compared with the mainland.

The 12-month inflation rates for both Oahu and the U.S. are the highest since 2008. Let’s just hope the experts are right in opining that the price spikes, reflecting pent-up demand and supply chain lags coming out of the pandemic, will be short-lived.