Alan Blinder Says He’s Betting Against Fed Raising Rates to 6%

Alan Blinder was one of the most-prominent voices this year to express optimism the Federal Reserve could engineer a soft landing by taming inflation without triggering a recession.

Now the Princeton University economist tells the What Goes Up podcast that he has toned down that optimism a bit, mostly due to a change in the way the government adjusts inflation data for seasonal factors. While prices moderated in the second half of last year, they didn’t cool off as quickly as previously indicated by the numbers. That means there’s reason to expect more rate increases, according to Blinder, who served in the 1990s as vice chair of the Fed and a member of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers. Still, he doesn’t see the central bank hiking to 6%, as some in the market are predicting.