From sawmills to store shelves, lumber can tell you a lot about what’s going on in the economy right now. Lumber prices soared over the past year… serving as a compelling talking point in the debate over whether government stimulus efforts risked the return of 1970s-style inflation. …But since then, the prices tumbled. …It’s a dance of supply and demand that has reassured many experts and the Federal Reserve in their belief that painful price spikes for everything from airline tickets to used cars will abate as the economy gets back to normal. …Some analysts think the recent rise in inflation is the result of temporary mismatches in supply and demand, rather than a harbinger of runaway price increases stoked by all the money pouring into the economy. …The lumber market’s behavior is a sign of consumer sanity, said Kristina Hooper, at the investment management firm Invesco.