And I think our new system is easily the toughest in government and the toughest I've seen anywhere. POWELL: We do take the need to protect our credibility with the public very seriously. And since then, the Feds adopted some new rules to limit trading by officials. Now, those officials insist no rules were broken, but Powell acknowledged it didn't look good. He's one of several officials who came under scrutiny for stock trades back in 2020 at a time when the Fed was preparing to intervene aggressively in financial markets. You know, just yesterday the Fed's vice chairman, Richard Clarida, announced he's stepping down two weeks ahead of schedule. Was that even addressed in the hearing today? Last year was this whole controversy over stock trading by Fed officials. You know, Biden has a chance to fill three more vacancies on the Fed's seven-member governing board.ĬHANG: Let me ask you one awkward thing for the central bank. This probably won't trip up Powell's nomination, but it could dog some of the president's other Fed picks. They think climate change is well outside the Fed's role. HORSLEY: Republicans, on the other hand, disagree. I don't think you want to see a lot of banks owning property that's literally underwater. JACK REED: The issue of climate change is absolutely critical.
For example, Democrats like Jack Reed of Rhode Island want the Fed to take a stronger stance against climate change. In addition to the inflation minefield, there are other policy fights ahead.
But that doesn't mean he's in for an easy time there in the second term. Powell has a lot of support on both sides of the aisle. Now he's been renominated by President Biden, and he's pretty likely to be confirmed, right? Well, just to remind everyone, Powell was originally promoted to Fed chairman by then-President Trump. But, you know, the Fed's been expecting that kind of relief for a while now, and it hasn't happened yet.ĬHANG: Yeah. HORSLEY: The Fed also expects supply problems to ease somewhat this year, especially if the omicron wave passes quickly. We're gonna have to be just very attentive to what's happening in the economy and willing to adapt, pretty nimbly, our policy as we go through the year.
JEROME POWELL: It's going to depend on the progress we see on the supply side, the progress we see on inflation. And Fed policymakers now say they expect to raise rates about three times this year, although Powell says it's still an open question just how hard the central bank will have to hit the brakes. Now, the central bank can't fix the supply chain problems, but it can try to tamp down on demand by raising interest rates. And during the pandemic, businesses have not been able to keep up. Prices have been climbing more than three times as fast as the Fed would like to see, and that's because people have just been buying an awful lot of stuff. So Powell and his colleagues at the Fed are clearly under a lot of pressure right now to do something about inflation. PAT TOOMEY: Every month that goes by in which inflation in the form of consumer prices is growing faster than wages are gaining is a month in which workers are falling behind.ĬHANG: NPR's Scott Horsley joins us now with more.
And at Powell's confirmation hearing today, Republican Senator Pat Toomey warned that the central bank has already waited too long to get prices under control. Jerome Powell is President Biden's pick to serve a second term as chairman of the Federal Reserve. The nation's top inflation watchdog had a job interview today, and it came when consumer prices are climbing at their fastest pace in nearly four decades.