Sometimes I wonder if the Fed every actually looks at the data. This, from Ann Saphir and Jonathon Spicer at Reuters:
With the U.S. economy humming along at its fastest clip in more than a decade, the Federal Reserve should be confident about its ability to weather a global slowdown and start lifting interest rates around the middle of next year.
But then there is inflation.
Interviews with Fed officials and those familiar with its thinking show the mood inside is more somber than the central bank's reassuring statements and evidence of robust economic health would suggest. The reason is the central bank's failure to nudge price growth up to its 2 percent target and, more importantly, signs that investors and consumers are losing faith it can get there any time soon...
..."The primary concern at the moment is whether you can get back to 2 percent in a way that keeps expectations anchored, and maintains the credibility of the Fed as an institution that can achieve its goal," said Jeffrey Fuhrer, the Boston Fed's senior policy advisor...
...One Fed official, who declined to be named, told Reuters policymakers must resist the urge to lift rates at the first opportunity because they might be forced to backtrack if inflation failed to pick up...
One would think that central bank officials would recognize that low inflation is not a new phenomenon. It has been a persistent phenomenon for the past twenty years:
Note the long periods of below trend core inflation. Has this trend really gone unnoticed on Constitution Avenue? Moreover, the periods of elevated inflation have been more persistent when unemployment is below 5%, compared to the current 5.8%. At current rates, I would say you are more likely to be below than about 2% inflation:
And even focusing on 5% you have to ignore the low inflation of the late 1990's as an outlier. It seems clear that the economy is only now moving into a range where upward pressure on inflation is more likely to occur. So why should the Fed be surprised at the inflation numbers?
Bottom Line: Sometimes I think the Fed's underlying pessimism stems from some belief that inflation and wage pressures were about to occur when there was absolutely no reason to hold such a belief. The economy is only just beginning to move into a zone where more interesting things could happen. Honestly, it would be much more interesting if the economy moved to 4% unemployment with no wage or price pressures.
