Weather and strikes weigh on February US jobs

The full mosaic (Slide 2) • The U.S. economy is complex — millions of households, workers, firms, and institutions interacting daily to produce, trade, and consume billions of dollars of goods and services. • The true state of all of this economic activity exists, but we only observe fragments. Individual data points are like tiles in a mosaic: the challenge for policymakers is to assemble the pieces to understand both current economic conditions and where they might be headed. Choosing the tiles (Slide 3) • Tiles represent different data points. They come from a lot of different data sources. The job of policymakers is to put them all together. • Some of the tilemakers are well established — i.e., the official statistical agencies. They have long series and are reliable, and it is well understood how their tiles are made. There are also newer tilemakers — the private sector data sources. • We can also create tiles, like the Beige Book, regional Federal Reserve Bank surveys, as well as insights that come from conversations with business and community contacts. Some of these data are tailored to the important issues of the day. Fed's Paulson does not comment on monetary policy and economic outlook.

Inventories in the manufacturing and trade sectors in the United States increased by 0.1% in December, month on month, standing at $2.68 trillion, the US Census Bureau revealed in ...

FED'S MIRAN: HESITANT TO READ TOO MUCH INTO 1 MONTH'S JOB REPORT CNBC Fed's Miran: The labor market could use more support from monetary policy. Fed's Miran: The Fed typically does not respond to oil prices. MIRAN: FED IS CHASING PHANTOM INFLATION, POLICY MISCALIBRATED FED'S MIRAN: IF ANYTHING IT BIASES ME TOWARD EVEN MORE DOVISH POLICY

MIRAN: I EXPECT TO DISSENT THIS MONTH IF FED DOESN'T CUT RATES FED'S MIRAN: NEUTRAL IS LIKE 2.5% TO 2.75% - WE SHOULD GET THERE, THEN RE-EVALUATE ...