Powell’s Homage to Greenspan Hints at a Fed Flashback
At Jackson Hole, the chairman goes retro by quoting a sage who went out of style with the last financial crisis.
What sort of agenda did Jerome Powell bring to Wyoming?
Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
It’s been a long time since Alan Greenspan gave the big speech at Jackson Hole.
And yet there he was, almost ubiquitous, in the ideas and words of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s speech at the central bank’s retreat in Wyoming. Powell heaped praise on Greenspan’s insight as chairman in the 1990s, perceiving that something that changed in the economy and that the old links between strong growth, a vibrant labor market and inflation had broken down. Rates didn’t have to increase as much as conventional wisdom at the time held that they should.