The figures below document this failure by the FOMC. The first figure shows the 5-year ‘breakeven’ or expected inflation rate. This is the difference between the 5-year nominal treasury yield and the 5-year TIPs yield and is suppose to reflect treasury market’s forecast for the average annual inflation rate over the next five years. The figure shows that prior to the September 16 FOMC meeting this spread declined from a high of 2.72 percent in early July to 1.23 percent on September 15. That is a decline of 1.23 percent over the two and half months leading up to the September FOMC meeting. This forward looking measure was screaming trouble ahead, but the FOMC ignored it.
He includes several charts. Read the whole thing. If you tell me that the expected inflation rate has declined from 2.72 percent to 1.23 percent, I think that this is somewhat bearish news. But it is not the end of the world.
See also Matt O’Brien‘s reading of the Fed minutes of 2008. It is quite stunning to consider Ben Bernanke’s behavior during September. On the one hand, he participated in the Paulson Panic, supporting TARP and going all out to save the banks. On the other hand he thought that the risks of inflation and recession were relatively balanced. It is consistent with my view of how the Fed looks at the world, which is through the eyes of the big NY financial institutions.
Still, the way I see it, the attempt to attribute the Great Recession to monetary policy seems forced. The people who believe it really believe it. And I cannot tell you that it is absolutely impossible that a small change in expected inflation can send the economy down the toilet. But I think that the human bias to try to find simple, single causes for things is something to correct for here.