With the Federal Funds rate hovering at zero percent and a more than $4 trillion response to the global COVID-19 pandemic, what’s next for Federal Reserve? In a groundbreaking speech, Fed chair Jerome Powell gave us a hint, and what he said will have wide repercussions for monetary policy that go beyond this pandemic.
Powell explained that the Fed will no longer follow a strict inflation targeting policy in their FOMC decisions. This was motivated by two reasons. First, the low unemployment rate did not lead to higher inflation in the pre-pandemic era. This implied