Search Results
Speech
The U.S. Economy: National Economic Outlook
In-person keynote presentation at the 2026 New York State Economic Development Council Annual Meeting, delivered by Kartik Athreya, Director of Research and Head of the Research and Statistics Group, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. This event was hosted by the New York State Economic Development Council in Cooperstown, New York.
Speech
Bullard Discusses Economic Outlook, Federal Debt, Currency Competition
St. Louis Fed President James Bullard shared his views on the policy responses to the pandemic, the U.S. economic outlook, debt-to-GDP ratios and currency competition. He spoke during a moderated panel discussion at the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) Economic Policy Conference.
Discussion Paper
What About Spending on Consumer Goods?
In a recent Liberty Street Economics post, I showed that one major category of consumer spending?spending on discretionary services such as recreation, transportation, and household utilities?behaved very differently in the 2007-09 recession and subsequent recovery than in previous business cycles: specifically, it fell more steeply and has recovered much more slowly. This finding prompted one of the editors of this blog to inquire whether consumer goods spending has also departed markedly from its behavior in past cycles. To answer that question, I examined the decline of expenditures on ...
Speech
Important choices for the Federal Reserve in the years ahead: remarks at Lehman College, Bronx, New York
Remarks at Lehman College, Bronx, New York.
Speech
The Waning Pandemic and the U.S. Economy
During a virtual presentation for Georgia State University’s Economic Forecasting Center, St. Louis Fed President James Bullard said that the COVID-19 pandemic’s intensity has moderated in the U.S. and Europe in recent weeks, and ongoing vaccinations suggest the health crisis will wane in the months ahead. He said that U.S. monetary and fiscal policies during the crisis continue to be exceptionally effective in mitigating macroeconomic damage. He noted that forecasts suggest very strong U.S. real GDP growth for 2021. But he cautioned that downside risk remains, and continued execution of ...
Journal Article
Wringing the Overoptimism from FOMC Growth Forecasts
Growth forecasts by Federal Open Market Committee meeting participants were persistently too optimistic for 2008 through 2016. The typical forecast started out high but was revised down over time, often dramatically, as incoming data failed to meet expectations. In contrast, forecasts for 2017 through 2019 started low but were revised up over time. Cumulative forecast revisions for these years were much smaller on average than in the past. These observations suggest that participants have adjusted their forecast methodology, including lowering estimates of trend growth, to eliminate the prior ...