The Fed Should Stop All Public Speaking Engagements
I doubt seriously the wisdom and utility of Jerome Powell (or any Fed official for that matter) participating in what amount to political debates during politically sensitive years. And these days, every debate is a political debate and every year is a politically sensitive year.
While previewing this week's scheduled Fed banter, I expressed reservations in that regard about Powell's forthcoming cameo at the Cato Institute's 40th Annual Monetary Conference.
Everyone loves to carry on about pu
I see the utility of the Fed sometimes making carefully designed and timed statements, but responding to grandstanding pretending to be questions, intended largely to aggrandize the interlocutor, is, I agree, counterproductive.
If you were Fed Chair, jyl, you definitely would have stolen the show:
“Mr. Goettler, pretend questions from aggrandizing grandstanding interlocutors are counterproductive.”
Fantastic piece on the state of public discourse.
You almost feel bad for Powell.
It’s not 1890 anymore… But the Fed has a worse alternative to the status quo- no Fed…..Ithink they should only speak to the public in Esperanto….
H-Man, I agree. Just let them leak the information via the press when they think a leak is warranted. Otherwise stick to the script in the Fed minutes.
I agree wholeheartedly with this assertion. If anything, it’s either useless as the officials all keep repeating the same thing over and over, or if there is something less than a consensus among their views, the most recent speaking engagement gets some added weight until the next one comes along.
But I am curious who the hell pays for these officials to travel all over the country to give these speeches at oddly precise times (e.g., 10:55 am), and am assuming that prep for these speeches falls until the purview of official duties paid by our taxes? In the end, it seems to me they spend much more time rationalizing what they’ve done than figuring out what they should do next.
Imagine going to the Customer Complaint department and rather than getting your complaint solved, you first have to listen to all the reasons why your complaint arose in the first place, why it was largely expected or no one’s fault, how they realize it’s a problem and are working on it, and that you should be patient and give it time because the situation is fluid.