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The Fed's tools are very blunt, and the only way it can reduce at-the-register prices for things like food and gas are indeed by hammering down aggregate demand
by prottog 4y ago
The Fed's tools are very blunt, and the only way it can reduce at-the-register prices for things like food and gas are indeed by hammering down aggregate demand, i.e. inducing a recession.
Of course, whatever the Fed does may be counterbalanced by supply-side issues, whether economic or political; a warmer-than-expected winter moderating gas prices, or executive actions impeding investment into O&G raising prices, and so on; and other demand-side issues, such as more helicopter money sprayed against fixed supply.
- apropos_g 4y ago> The Fed's tools are very blunt, and the only way it can reduce at-the-register prices for things like food and gas are indeed by hammering down aggregate demand, i.e. inducing a recession. By some measures, it's not even succeeding in inducing a recession. Demand isn't even necessarily declining - you would need a common sense explanation why the rate of increase in demand doesn't sometimes fluctuate or go down anyway, in the absence of fed action. The Fed's tools are extremely effective at taking a huge shit on bond prices. They have huge financial impacts. But you are not giving me a common sense explanation for how raising interest rates will reduce the prices of food and gas.
- alienicecream 4y agoThey're trying to reduce the rate of inflation, not "the price of food and gas". Depending on the measure of inflation you're using, food and gas might not even be in that measure.
- za3faran 4y agoWhat's the guarantee that inducing a recession would be recoverable at some point in the future?