LHMeyer/Monetary Policy AnalyticsSolid Hiring Without Wage Jump Tests Fed Hopes for Inflation Bloomberg News on September 02, 2016 “Slack doesn’t matter” as much as it once did, said Laurence Meyer, who as a Fed governor from 1996 to 2002 was one of central bank’s biggest proponents of the Phillips Curve, a description of the tradeoff between unemployment […]
Last Week in Fedspeak Nine FOMC participants spoke last week, with many speaking while attending the Jackson Hole conference. Many of them spoke multiple times. The most prominent remarks came from Yellen. [See our recent commentary on this topic.] Most participants left the door open for a September hike, while others leaned in that direction. […]
We saw three themes in remarks of FOMC participants last week. Most of the speakers saw at least one hike as likely appropriate this year, based on initial conditions—basically at full employment and confidence inflation headed to 2%—and a relatively optimistic forecast. The “show me the inflation” camp was not well represented last week, but […]
We have noted that Williams is in the so-called “initial conditions” group that bases its monetary policy views on the proximity to full employment and confidence that inflation is headed toward the 2% target. Still, his view of appropriate policy has moved from four hikes in 2016, at the beginning of the year, to appearing […]
Fed Finds Dots Are Just Dots, Failing to Convey Forecast Doubts Bloomberg News on August 11, 2016 There are few guidelines to inform Fed officials’ “judgment about the pace at which the funds rate should rise to keep the economy at full employment and price stability,” said former Fed governor Laurence Meyer, who now runs […]
The following FOMC participants spoke, all before the employment report on Friday: Harker, Kaplan, Kashkari, Evans, Powell, and Lockhart. We saw three themes. First, while some members continued to say that September is on the table, they didn’t seem to be very convincing. Second, participants had somewhat different preconditions for the next hike: improvement in […]
There were remarks, by Williams, Kaplan, and Dudley, which focused on the interpretation of the Q2 GDP report and its implications for near-term monetary policy. President Williams gave a press conference on Friday, shortly after the release of GDP data. He saw part of the weakness in Q2 as the result of volatility in inventories, […]
Yellen Still Waiting for Overwhelming Evidence to Warrant Hike Bloomberg News on July 25, 2016 “Upside surprises affect the committee less than downside surprises,” says former Fed governor Laurence Meyer, who now runs a Washington policy analysis firm that bears his name. “There is not a chance that they are going to go at this […]
The following FOMC participants spoke: Bullard, George, Harker, Lockhart, Mester, Kaplan, and Kashkari. There were several themes across last week’s speeches and interviews. The first was that FOMC participants generally downplayed any effect of Brexit on the near-term U.S. outlook. Harker, for example, said “Brexit is low on my list of risks.” Lockhart said “I […]
Following the release of the FOMC minutes for the June meeting, the theme was clearly uncertainty. For a number of participants there has been a resounding theme of hesitation when it comes to recent developments in the economy. That uncertainty, revealed in discussions about the neutral fed funds rate along with topics such as the […]