“Under a cold turkey strategy, at each policy meeting the Federal Open Market Committee would make its best guess about where it ultimately wants the funds rate to be and would move to that rate in a single step.” WantMovingStepsPolicyColdStrategyMeetingsRateFundCommitteesTurkeysSingle StepCold Turkey Author:Ben Bernanke
“The risk exists that, with aggregate demand exhibiting considerable momentum, output could overshoot its sustainable path, leading ultimately in the absence of countervailing monetary policy action to further upward pressure on inflation.” ActionEconomyPathRiskPolicyDemandPressureAbsenceInflationMomentumMonetaryOutputMonetary Policy Author:Ben Bernanke
“The more guidance a central bank can provide the public about how policy is likely to evolve the greater the chance that market participants will make appropriate inferences.” ChanceGreaterPolicyEvolveGuidanceAppropriateParticipantsCentral BanksInference Author:Ben Bernanke
“I think that having good data, good statistics-and the United States generally has better macroeconomic statistics than most countries-and having good economists to interpret those data and present the policy alternatives, has a substantially beneficial effect on policymaking in the United States.” ThinkingCountryStatesUnitedUnited StatesEffectsPolicyDataAlternativesStatisticsEconomistBeneficialMacroeconomics Author:Ben Bernanke
“Inflation is certainly low and stable and, measured in unemployment and labour-market slack, the economy has made a lot of progress. The pace of growth is disappointingly slow, mostly because productivity growth has been very slow, which is not really something amenable to monetary policy. It comes from changes in technology, changes in worker skills and a variety of other things, but not monetary policy, in particular.” GrowthTechnologyEconomyProgressPolicyProductivityVarietyInflationMonetary Author:Ben Bernanke
“I served seven years as the chair of the Princeton economics department where I had responsibility for major policy decisions, such as whether to serve bagels or doughnuts at the department coffee hour.” YearsHoursDecisionResponsibilityPolicyMajorsEconomicsSevenCoffeeDepartmentChairsSeven YearsDoughnutPrincetonBagels Author:Ben Bernanke
“If I am confirmed, I am confident that my colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee and I will maintain the focus on long-term price stability as monetary policy's greatest contribution to general economic prosperity and maximum employment.” IfsLongTermFocusEconomicPolicyProsperityEmploymentLong TermContributionStabilityCommitteesColleaguesMaximumMonetaryMonetary PolicyEconomic ProsperityPrice Stability Author:Ben Bernanke
“The basic prescription for preventing deflation is therefore straightforward, at least in principle: Use monetary and fiscal policy as needed to support aggregate spending, in a manner as nearly consistent as possible with full utilization of economic resources and low and stable inflation. In other words, the best way to get out of trouble is not to get into it in the first place.” WayFirstsUseBusinessPrinciplesSupportEconomyTroubleEconomicPolicyNeededLowsResourcesEconomicsSpendingBest WayFinanceConsistentStableInflationStraightforwardMonetaryPrescriptionsPreventingUtilizationDeflationFiscal PolicyEconomic Resources Author:Ben Bernanke
“The central bank needs to be able to make policy without short term political concerns.” NeedsAblePoliticalTermPolicyConcernShort TermCentral Banks Author:Ben Bernanke
“Monetary policy cannot do much about long-run growth, all we can try to do is to try to smooth out periods where the economy is depressed because of lack of demand” TryingLongRunningGrowthEconomyPolicyPeriodsDemandLong RunsSmoothMonetaryMonetary Policy Author:Ben Bernanke
