Feldstein v. Lazear

pgl:

Feldstein v. Lazear on the Size of the Output Gap , econospeak: Martin Feldstein is worried that the Federal Reserve will not reverse its increase in the monetary base even as we approach full employment:

Here is what worries me... If the unemployment rate is still very high when product markets begin to tighten, the US Congress will want the Fed to allow more rapid growth in order to bring it down, despite the resulting risk to inflation. The Fed is technically accountable to Congress, which could apply pressure on the Fed by threatening to reduce its independence. So inflation is a risk, even if it is not inevitable. The large volume of reserves ... makes that risk greater. It will take skill – as well as political courage – for the Fed to avoid the rise in inflation that the existing liquidity has created.

Dr. Feldstein is implicitly saying that the GDP gap is not as large as what Ed Lazear wants us to believe:

During the postwar period up to the current recession (1947-2007), the average annual growth rate for the U.S. was 3.4%. The last three decades have experienced somewhat slower growth than the earlier periods, but even in the period 1977-2007, the average growth rate was 3%. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recovery began in the second half of 2009. Since that time, the economy has grown at 2.4%, below our long-term trend by either measure. At this point, the economy is 12% smaller than it would have been had we stayed on trend growth since 2007. ...

Lazear wants us to believe that the economy could have continued to grow by 3.4% per year since 2007QIV... In other words, Lazear wants us to believe that the current GDP gap is 12%. ...

Republicans are simultaneously pushing two themes. One theme is that current Federal Reserve policy is endangering an inflationary spiral, which seems to be the concern of Dr. Feldstein. The other theme is that the Obama Administration is somehow making the recession worse, which Dr. Lazear was so happy to echo. Funny thing – these two themes appear to be contradictory.

Andy Harless on Twitter:

Feldstein says inflation is a "risk." I would express the same point by saying that there is "some hope" for inflation. Not much, though.

Andy will be disappointed to hear that James Bullard is also convinced that the gap is smaller than most people believe, and that the Fed's commitment to keep interest rates low through the end of 2014 is harming the economy:

Concerning the FOMC’s communications tool, the “late 2014” language describing the length of the near-zero rate policy may be counterproductive, he said.  “The Committee’s practice of including distant dates in the statement sends an unwarranted pessimistic signal concerning the future of the U.S. economy.”

Regarding the output gap and housing markets, “the U.S. output gap may be smaller than typical estimates suggest,” Bullard said, adding that typical estimates count the “housing bubble” as part of the normal level of output.  However, he said, “It is neither feasible nor desirable to attempt to re-inflate the U.S. housing bubble of the mid-2000s.”

At least he's not calling for interest rates to go up --- at least not yet:

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard ... said that brighter prospects for the U.S. economy provide the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) with the opportunity to pause in its aggressive easing campaign.  “An appropriate approach at this juncture may be to continue to pause to assess developments in the economy,” he stated.

But he seems to be setting the stage to call for the Fed to abandon its interest rate commitment, e.g. statements such as "low interest rates hurt savers" (see here on this point).

I think that would be a mistake. How much uncertainty does Bullard have around his estimate of potential output? If it's not a substantial amount, it ought to be and the best policy in the face of such uncertainty is to lean against the more costly outcome (it also seems to me that he has chosen a forecast with one-sided errors -- it's unlikely that potential output is much lower than his current estimate, but it couldbe much higher). As I've been stressing recently (along with Stevenson and Wolfers, DeLong, and others), since high unemployment is far more costly than a temporary bout of inflation, policy ought to be directed primarily at the unemployment problem. If and when there are signs that inflation is increasing, and that labor markets are close to full recovery, then the Fed can start laying the groundwork for interest rate increases prior to 2014. But any talk of easing off its commitment before then and the loss of credibility that comes with it would be, to echo Bullard's term, counterproductive.