I have used the Excel/Word/Keynote formats with iWork and it’s okay. MS Office is the de-facto standard format and recognized by Google Docs, OpenOffice, and of course MS Office.
I don’t think it’s a truly open format like ODF, but you can be sure it’ll be recognized everywhere for a long time.
Inflation has been falling for a couple years and is fairly low right now, though not as low as it was back when interest rates were zero.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/273418/unadjusted-monthly-inflation-rate-in-the-us/
The dollar has been fairly strong in recent years.
https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/index/dxy/charts
Inflation in 2022 was likely due to price gouging with companies like Exxon Mobil reporting record or near-record profits at that time.
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/XOM/exxon/gross-profit
By late 2022, companies had jacked up prices high enough that the demand curve had likely reached the “crossover” point. Since then prices and inflation have been falling back to normal.