Plucky player has time to take in a measure of inflation (7)
I believe the answer is:
harpist
'plucky player' is the definition.
(musician who plucks harp strings)
'has time to take in a measure of inflation' is the wordplay.
'time' becomes 't' (abbreviation).
'to take in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'a measure of inflation' becomes 'RPI' (retail price index).
'has'+'t'='hast'
'hast' placed around 'rpi' is 'HARPIST'.
(Other definitions for harpist that I've seen before include "musician" , "Instrumentalist" , "Stringed instrument player" .)