Ben Bernanke
Ben Bernanke
Ben Shalom Bernankeis an American economist at the Brookings Institution who served two terms as chairman of the Federal Reserve, the central bank of the United States, from 2006 to 2014. During his tenure as chairman, Bernanke oversaw the Federal Reserve's response to the late-2000s financial crisis. Before becoming Federal Reserve chairman, Bernanke was a tenured professor at Princeton University and chaired the department of economics there from 1996 to September 2002, when he went on public service leave...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth13 December 1953
CityAugusta, GA
CountryUnited States of America
A very important factor is the fact that inflation expectations are well-controlled and well-contained, which means that the Federal Reserve, unlike the 70s, doesn't have to react violently in terms of raising interest rates to contain the second- and third-round inflationary impacts. So I remain pretty optimistic about the economy,
High energy prices are burdening household budgets and raising production costs, and continued increases would at some point restrain economic growth.
Community banks are generally doing quite well, and I expect that good performance to continue. Neither bankers nor their supervisors should become complacent.
Preventing liquidation of an unbalanced market will leave you in tears.
However, more recently, there have been signs of some easing of underwriting standards.
The U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost,
I have spoken about deficits, and I think deficits are important because they address broad economic and financial stability. We need to talk about that.
A.I.G. was even larger than Lehman, with a substantial presence in derivatives and debt markets, as well as in insurance markets.
In the absence of a shift in market perceptions of the relative attractiveness of U.S. and foreign assets, government policies would likely have only limited effects on the trade balance.
If bankers become overly conservative in response to past lending mistakes - or if examiners force such behavior - it will hurt bankers' own long-term interests and the economy in general.
In these circumstances, the FOMC judged that some further firming of monetary policy may be necessary, an assessment with which I concur.
Congress had made clear that it has affirmed the principle of keeping banking and commerce separate. This loophole ... circumvents that principle. If Congress wants to revisit banking and commerce, that's their prerogative but it doesn't seem a good approach to allow a loophole in which that distinction breaks down.
The economy is much more energy efficient today than it was in the 1970s when energy shocks contributed to share slowdowns,
The Federal Reserve Act requires the Federal Reserve to report annually on its operations and to publish its balance sheet weekly.