Quotes About Economy

The economy seemed to pick up for a few months, but by the time of our March 2003 meeting the recovery again seemed stalled. Shockingly,

He told me that the Fed should do what it believed necessary.

years. That would give people a pretty good idea of where we were trying to steer the economy,

would permit us to more aggressively loosen policy in support of job creation.

Portugal's relatively weak economy had in turn weakened its fiscal position.

policymakers had to weigh what might happen if Greece, after a default,

These longer-term rates are not under the Fed's direct control. Instead, they are set by participants in financial markets.

As always, I follow the economy closely. But it's liberating to read about policy debates knowing that someone else will have to make and defend the tough decisions.

With little room to cut the funds rate further, how could we put downward pressure on longer-term rates?

How do you draw the line between a healthy, exciting economic boom and a wanton, speculative stock-market bubble driven by the less savory aspects of human nature? As I pointed out drily to the House Banking Committee, the question was all the more complicated because the two can coexist.

stimulating demand and pushing inflation up toward our target.

The Bear Stearns rescue was followed by a period of relative calm, but we remained wary.

the consequences of not having a single fiscal authority for the eurozone became apparent.

markets didn't have enough examples of Fed behavior in similar circumstances.

Wall Street and Main Street are interconnected and interdependent,

it is similar to the central bank balance sheets of other major industrial countries.

leaving the overall size of its balance sheet unchanged.

it seemed to me that the health of the U.S. economy was linked to what happened in Europe.

Of course, how far and how fast rates would rise depended on the economy.

The pace was much faster than at the Fed.

Still, over time, optimism about resolving Europe's problems faded.

However, markets saw the European effort as vague and insufficiently ambitious.

We discussed risks that European developments might pose to the United States, but to date those risks had not materialized.

Unfortunately, for some major foreign economies, consistently achieving inflation goals has been difficult