Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today.1 I have spent most of my career conducting research and overseeing research by others, first as a professor and later as a research director in the Federal Reserve System. More recently, I have been more of a consumer than a producer of research as a member of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). Eight times a year, the FOMC meets to set the appropriate stance of monetary policy to achieve the economic goals assigned to us by the U.S. Congress. We discuss where the economy stands in relation to those goals, how it is likely to evolve, and the implications for ... (full story)