(NewsMax - Finance) - On the eve of a highly anticipated speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, on Friday, the original “Dr. Doom” is urging the Fed to become even more aggressive in its fight against inflation.
Henry Kaufman, Salomon Brothers chief economist during the hyperinflation of the 1970s, thinks Powell has not been heavy-handed enough, the Financial Times reports.
“I am still waiting for him to act boldly—‘boldly’ means he has to shock the market,” says Kaufman, also a former economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. “If you want to change someone’s view, if you want to change someone’s action, you can’t slap them on the hand. You have to hit them in the face.”
“Dr. Doom” maintains the Fed is still “behind the curve” in its battle to bring inflation down from its 40-year high of 8.5%, whereas Fed Chair Paul Volcker positioned himself well “ahead of the curve.”
Kaufman points to the fact that the Fed only began increasing interest rates in March, months after Powell finally admitted that inflation had become problematic.
Nouriel Roubini of Roubini Macro Associates—a former Clinton administration economic adviser and another economist who’s earned the “Dr. Doom” sobriquet—says the choices the Federal Reserve has in its monetary policy are stark: either a “hard landing,” i.e. a recession, or continued elevated inflation.
“The fed funds rate should be going well above 4%—4.5% to 5% in my view—to really push inflation towards 2%,” Roubini tells Bloomberg. “If that doesn’t happen, inflation expectations are going to get unhinged.”
By Lee Barney
August 25, 2022
