President Biden was hoping for a break on inflation before the midterm elections on Nov. 8. Instead, it came two days later. Better late than never.

The annual pace of inflation slowed from 8.2% in September to 7.7% in October. That’s still too high, and key essentials such as food and transportation are rising by more. But economists now see clear signs that inflation has peaked and will probably continue to decline to normal levels.

“Disinflation begins in earnest,” Capital Economics said in a Nov. 11 analysis. “The October report showed the widespread disinflationary pressure evident in other private-sector measures finally feeding through.” Disinflation is a decline in the rate of inflation, while overall inflation remains positive. Deflation is a decline in prices, or negative inflation, which has generally not yet occurred, but could.

For Biden, high inflation has been a political issue, since it sours voters on the incumbent leadership—him—and gives Republican critics potent ammunition to fire his way. Yet the Democrats’ over-performance in the midterms suggests inflation and a slowing economy haven’t hurt Biden as much as just about everybody expected.

Once all the votes are counted, Democrats will probably lose control of the House, but by a much smaller margin than nearly all election forecasts predicted. Exit polls show that abortion and election-security concerns were a bigger factor among voters than earlier polls suggested, with the economy being slightly less of a concern. Maybe voters had a sense that inflation was already receding, or they found solace in the sharp drop in gas prices since they hit $5 per gallon in June.

The improving inflation outlook is also a huge relief for investors, of course, mostly because it influences how high the Federal Reserve will push interest rates. There have been several false rallies in the stock market since the summer, when traders guessed that forthcoming inflation data would show notable improvements that would allow the Fed to back off. Those fizzled when inflation data came in hot instead. But markets now seem to think we’ve turned the corner for good, with the S&P 500 and NASDAQ indexes ripping higher on the October inflation data.