It's a nice effort at re-correction, but one that, to me, strikes of the kind of governmental tinkering with the economy that Macro Economists like Milton Friedman warn policy makers away from. Do we need to continue at the gangbusters pace of the past seven years? No. Do we need to have a tech heavy Nasdaq surging ahead of where the Dow was not six years ago? I don't think so. I'm not sure how long the slow-down would have lasted, but I'm just more comfortable when the Fed makes more deliberate moves rather than "surprising" the financial markets in this manner. The CNN report says that some experts had expected something before the FOMC meeting in late January. I'm not sure what, exactly motivated this aside from some poor economic data. It seems like the Fed has started reading USA Today a little too much in recent weeks. Unless the Fed has some figures that show the recent economic turn as being far more pervasive than has been reported, I don't think there was a need to act merely 27 days early. Especially if it was in response to financial markets.

My Dad is going to think this was politically motivated in order to make the people feel good about the Bush Presidency by the time of his inauguration. To me that's a little narrow especially with regard to a Chairman who has repeatedly shredded the economic ideas Bush and other republicans on the hill have advanced.
- posted by levinson @ 1/03/2001 11:16:00 AM