Inflation in a homebrew world

So in my current campaign, the main kingdom has fallen into hard times due to terror attacks and a weak ruler. Does anyone have an easy way to ramp up prices and truly make the players feel these hard times?

Yes. It's called you the DM just giving prices a modifier. It's really not that hard to do. You can do x2 modifier x3 or even x4. Or just add a set amount of gold to the price. (Price of Item) + 200. 

Inflation happens because either there is an excess of money so people are willing to pay more or for some reason the cost of producing goods rises. In the case of war time inflation it's mainly that there is a lack of goods because resources get put to other purposes or destroyed. So you would have empty shelves, stores closing down, rationing, merchants having to put things on back order and some things just impossible to get. 

Not all items will be effected equally for example

• if the country is arming itself then the cost of metal and weapons may be allot higher than other things.
• If there are mass causalities  then the cost of healing supplies will be allot higher. 
• If infrastructure has been damaged or there is a loss of labor force then the cost of things like food and other perishable goods may sky rocket. 

So you can use the specifics of whats happening to paint a story.  However.... 

Quote from ShadowLander >>

Yes. It's called you the DM just giving prices a modifier. It's really not that hard to do. You can do x2 modifier x3 or even x4. Or just add a set amount of gold to the price. (Price of Item) + 200. 

 this is also true and there is value in keeping it simple