, Columnist
The Fed’s Risk Management Is Now the Big Economic Risk
The danger is that policymakers place so much weight on moving slowly before cutting interest rates that they put a soft landing at risk.
So many questions.
Photographer: Julia Nikhinson/AFP via Getty Images
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The inflation problem is largely behind us, and most signs suggest that Federal Reserve policymakers know it. So why didn’t they just go ahead and cut rates on Wednesday instead of leaving their target range at 5.25% to 5.5%? Why wait until March or (more likely) May?
Outside of obvious recessions, that’s just the way they do things at the Fed: very, very slowly.