Source stringclasses 1
value | Date int64 1.98k 2.01k | Text stringlengths 2 27.1k | Token_count int64 1 5.57k |
|---|---|---|---|
fomc | 1,978 | Phil. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Are there any prospects that the Canadians will want to draw [on] us? | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, as you know, they've come to our capital market and have a large Eurodollar loan. I think they would probably use those resources-- | 30 |
fomc | 1,978 | They're taking $750 million against-- | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | I just wonder whether the next round might be with us. | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | No. I think they have still [available] in their Euro loan and they have not yet drawn on the New York line. So they've got quite a few resources. Although who can tell over time? | 41 |
fomc | 1,978 | Gentlemen, I think we better move along. Now this subject has taken an hour and a half of our time. The next subject returns us to the world that will be more familiar to some of us, and that's the economic and financial situation here at home. Jim, I think you're going to lead off our discussion of this subject. | 69 |
fomc | 1,978 | [Statement--see Appendix.] | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Jim. Discussion? Larry. | 9 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, may I ask a question? Jim, in your analysis, you make frequent reference to the price changes and wage trends and things like that. Unless I misunderstood it, there was practically no reference in your report to past rates of monetary expansion. When you do this [analysis] relating to prices, do you give ... | 78 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, not in the direct fashion of simply looking at the rate of growth of the aggregates and tracking it through. It does, in our view, show up in wages and costs with a lag. So, in our own judgmental approach, we pick it up in an indirect fashion. In our quarterly model, which we also use in developing our price fore... | 150 |
fomc | 1,978 | Frank. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, I think it would be well for the Committee in this context to keep a fairly open mind on the question of how strong the economy really is because I don't think we have a very good fix on the underlying strength of the economy. We're looking at numbers, some of which show great weakness, and we're dismissi... | 365 |
fomc | 1,978 | Is the expected continued rapid growth in the labor force based in part on an expectation of continued strong increases in the participation rate of women or is it pretty much just a pickup in population? | 37 |
fomc | 1,978 | We have a drifting up of the participation rate, but at a slower rate than we have experienced in the last several years. Our view is that we will begin to see a somewhat slower rate of growth in the labor force compared to what we experienced the first three years into this expansion. | 57 |
fomc | 1,978 | The rate of growth in the labor force is at about 2-1/2 percent or slightly under that, as opposed to slightly over 3 percent for last year. It has moderated somewhat. | 40 |
fomc | 1,978 | The large projected decline in unemployment seems rather strong given the projection of the labor force and given the prospect of some slowing in real growth. | 27 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, that's true. I think one of the big surprises relates to the recent performance, more so than our projections. That's particularly true for the third and fourth quarters. In the latter half of last year, real growth slowed substantially and the unemployment rate came down by over 1/2 point, and that is quite unus... | 189 |
fomc | 1,978 | Do you have any particular reason to be skeptical of some of the changes in the BLS data programs? | 21 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'm not aware of any. Jerry, you may be. | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | Not particularly. They have increased recently the size of the sample for collecting labor force employment and unemployment data but that should have improved the data, if anything. They have changed the pattern slightly, but basically there seems to be no significant deterioration in the quality of those data. | 54 |
fomc | 1,978 | Dave. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a comment: I'm still thinking about the remark you made about the need to slow growth [to improve] the balance of payments [and] the dollar. | 39 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'm not sure I said that. I said there was some sentiment that that may be the choice. | 20 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, some sentiment about the need to do it. I detected some sentiment that it goes even further than that and that it really may be necessary to have a recession and that the thing to do now is to try to choose the kind of recession we'd like to have. This gives me some concern, partly because coming from the area tha... | 71 |
fomc | 1,978 | You never came out of the recession. | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | This gives me some concern because we haven't come out of it. We have some banks that would have a good deal more difficulty than they are having now if we had a recession. | 36 |
fomc | 1,978 | Is this a local comment, Dave? | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, it is. It's just a comment that I think we need to emphasize inflation, as we have been, but preferably stress the point that more and more we're coming to believe that inflation does lead to recession--that there are built-in factors that lead from one to the other. So the posture that we ought to have is to work... | 92 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you. Henry. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'd like to go back to the employment data once more, if I may. About six months ago, in the September Greenbook, I think it was estimated that for the first quarter of '78 the unemployment rate would be 6.8 percent and that by the fourth quarter of '78 it would be 6.6 percent. Here we are in March and the unemployment... | 362 |
fomc | 1,978 | Have a speedy soft landing? | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, a speedy soft landing. I thought we had a year or two years, but I think it's probably less. The sustainable rate of growth is something like 3-1/2 percent, I think. We need to envisage getting to that within a year or so; there would be no great damage if that were attained around that time or even a little earli... | 130 |
fomc | 1,978 | Chuck. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'd like to turn Frank Morris's comment to you, Henry. I think we shouldn't be too certain about what's going on in the labor force or the unemployment rate. I couldn't help but note when I looked at the Greenbook that over the last three months the civilian labor force has increased at an annual rate of 0.9 percent; o... | 600 |
fomc | 1,978 | Bones. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, I'm sure [our view] is influenced heavily by the Sun Belt exposure but [based on] our recent swing around the District [talking] with community leaders, including ladies and consumer advocates, we are just unavoidably attached to the idea that inflation is rampant, and we are very, very much concerned. It... | 251 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I don't feel good about them in the sense that I wish they would be lower but you're looking at our best point estimate. So, yes, we do feel pretty good about those numbers as our best guess. But certainly in my view the risk is on the upside--that we'll have higher unit labor costs rather than lower. | 67 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mark. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was impressed with Jim's comment that on the price side the risk would seem to be on the upside rather than the downside in the absence of some effective Administration anti-inflation policy. I'd like to ask you or him or anybody what the chances are that we will have an effective Administrat... | 80 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, confidentially, the Administration is examining what more aggressive anti-inflation program could be undertaken within the policy of moderation that has been indicated in the economic package. That action, if taken, would be both direct governmental action and would be inclined to marshal similar support in the p... | 392 |
fomc | 1,978 | May I just pursue that a little bit further? The businessmen that I have spoken with have read reports of most of these things that you've [mentioned] and greet them with a very high degree of skepticism. Even if the Administration tried to do them, the businessmen I speak with are very skeptical that [these programs] ... | 97 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think they base their skepticism on experience because there have been a lot of toothless programs. I think the question is: Will people get serious enough and take real action? Is the President willing to veto legislation that breaks the budget? Is he willing to go into aggressive control of expenditures beyond the ... | 224 |
fomc | 1,978 | Is anybody looking at the Okun/Wallich idea of the tax-oriented incomes policy? SPEAKER(?) Yes, they're both looking at it! | 29 |
fomc | 1,978 | I would quote the father of the idea. He said of his child that it's a great idea but he wouldn't enact it into law today because it's premature. I don't think it can be a part of the action in the next few weeks. I think it can be looked at in terms of a more structural change over time, Frank. It needs to be studied.... | 82 |
fomc | 1,978 | We'll have a conference on this at Brookings within a month. I have a 150-page analysis of the technicalities of it now, which says that it's bad but no worse than the income equalization tax. | 43 |
fomc | 1,978 | [Given] my knowledge of Congress, I'd say that 150 pages of technical details [translates into] about 10 years in Congress. So, I think it's going to be slow to come to that. And I think there are some reasons why we have to be cautious because there could be some effects in capital intensive industries that would have... | 326 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, in terms of the difficulties of getting some kind of coordinated program which might have some appeal to the public--on the grounds that it would appear to have some chance of making an impact on inflation--would you see the major problem as getting a consensus view in the Administration or getting suppor... | 75 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I think an anti-inflation program will [require] Presidential leadership and action. If you consult with Congress about it, you will still be consulting next October! One of the problems with taking [action] is that everybody has his parochial view. Everybody wants to say well, in my parochial view I've got to co... | 142 |
fomc | 1,978 | I would second that. I sense a real demand for it out in the country. | 17 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, if I understood you correctly, I understood you to say that there are very limited things that we can do. If we were to gradually slow down money growth, as we have publicly said in the past we wanted to do, wouldn't this be a signal to the world and to this country and to everybody that the Federal Reser... | 91 |
fomc | 1,978 | If other actions aren't taken, we would have to continue the process, which we will no doubt do. And if we do, inevitably that will lead to a slowing down in capital investment and in homebuilding and it will lead to a recession. That's why I hope that other actions can be taken, not just ours. Let me ask you again ple... | 206 |
fomc | 1,978 | Why not go through with it? | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | All right, let's take the four who are listed so far. Bob Mayo. | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I am mindful of Frank's point on the optimism and that we might get too enthusiastic about a rebound from the first quarter. I don't feel, however, that the staff projection has incorporated an overly optimistic tone on the second quarter; the staff has toned down its figures for the year in a rea... | 455 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Bob. Phil. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, let me ask one question first. Jim, in working out your forecast for the remainder of the year--well, let me state it as an assumption. I assume you knew of the downgrading of the fourth-quarter GNP--the recent announcement--before you went into this [projection exercise]. | 64 |
fomc | 1,978 | No, that became available to the staff yesterday afternoon. We had suspected a small downward revision, and on a revised basis it went from 4 percent real growth at an annual rate to 3.8 percent. But the data became available after we had prepared the projection. | 55 |
fomc | 1,978 | If you had known this, would you have shaded your figures down? | 14 |
fomc | 1,978 | No, I don't think so. We anticipated a small change in business fixed investment as one of the areas of downward revision and we cheated a little bit by trying to link our forecast to our suspicions of the way that the revisions would take place. Similarly, net exports were revised down and we had a bit of a lead on th... | 82 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, I guess I'm seconding Henry's comments in a way. It seems to me that we're faced with a difficult problem here of slow growth in two consecutive quarters. One is theoretically because of the coal strike and cold weather. The other one has now become less than expected--at the 3.8 percent level [for the fo... | 363 |
fomc | 1,978 | I don't say thank you to that. Willis. | 10 |
fomc | 1,978 | It would be my guess that the wage settlement is really causing unrest in public service groups, [with] other people feeling that this was endorsed here and they're entitled to the same sort of [increase in wages]. Second, I think we shouldn't underestimate the amount of time that it's going to take to rebuild stocks. ... | 298 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you. Paul. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'll be brief with a couple of random comments, Mr. Chairman. I don't think there is a great deal of informational content, as a number of people have said, in the recent statistics so far as the future is concerned. My own presumption is that [the economy] should be fairly strong after we get through this period, reco... | 459 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, if you believe those figures. | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | If I believe his figures? | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'm not sure I would go that far. But you don't have to [agree] totally with him to see the sizable discrepancy in that. | 28 |
fomc | 1,978 | If you contemplate what Humphrey-Hawkins implies, if anybody abroad thought this would be taken seriously, we would be disavowing all our anti-inflation effort. | 35 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I agree with that. But what position are we put in by this bill when we have to go up there and in effect say that our policies are-- | 33 |
fomc | 1,978 | We'll have to find an ingenious way to [indicate] that our policies are taking account of the other parts [of the legislation]. We also have to work toward price stability and fight inflation. | 39 |
fomc | 1,978 | We'll have a division of labor. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | On those occasions, I will invite one of the other members to testify! John, I think we'll ask you to comment as the last speaker. Then I have an experiment I'd like to try. | 39 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, if I can just pick up on Paul's point, I think there is an answer. If we go on the Hill vis-a-vis a Humphrey-Hawkins bill [that says] full employment is 4 percent unemployment, there's considerable evidence in my view at least--and Dave alluded to this earlier--that inflation does cause recession, and recession c... | 382 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you. I'd like to try an experiment. Jim, would you give me three numbers--and I want everyone to write them down. First, what is your objective or what does the staff have in mind for the real growth in GNP '78 calendar year over '77. | 57 |
fomc | 1,978 | Year over year? | 4 |
fomc | 1,978 | Or fourth quarter to fourth quarter? | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Okay, give me fourth quarter over fourth quarter. | 10 |
fomc | 1,978 | 4.4 percent. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | Okay, write that down. Now give me your year-end unemployment rate. | 15 |
fomc | 1,978 | Our fourth-quarter unemployment rate is 5.9 percent. | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | That's the average for the fourth quarter, not year-end? | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | Right. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Then write down your deflator. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Fourth quarter to fourth quarter, it's 6.6 percent. | 13 |
fomc | 1,978 | Now the experiment I would like to try: I will not use the data except to experiment, but during the coffee break or sometime today, would you write down individually what you think those figures would be within a range. Use a range. Do you expect GNP is going to be, you know, 4-1/4 to 4-3/4 percent or do you expect it... | 156 |
fomc | 1,978 | [Statement--see Appendix.] | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Peter. Questions? Comments? Yes, Henry. | 13 |
fomc | 1,978 | Peter, has it ever been pointed out to our friends abroad that when they buy Treasury bills so single-mindedly, that they have reduced the interest differential and, therefore, find themselves buying more Treasury bills? | 41 |
fomc | 1,978 | We have pointed it out to them and have sought additional flexibility. Of course, they have to do something with their funds. They want to put them in some earning form and we have urged some of them to give us greater flexibility as to the maturity of bills that they can buy, stretching out to longer issues--stretchin... | 112 |
fomc | 1,978 | They don't generally buy anything but bills or something shorter, right? | 13 |
fomc | 1,978 | No, for some of the accounts, the initial step is usually to take what dollars they have accumulated and immediately buy bills. But some of them have been on programs of funding out some of their holdings. Germany and Japan have gone a considerable way in this direction and the United Kingdom has as well. | 60 |
fomc | 1,978 | We ought to encourage them. | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | We have pointed out the available range of investments to them. | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | Are they aware that at the present time this great concentration of buying is actually pushing down the bill rate a little? | 23 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think they are aware of that. | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, Phil. | 4 |
fomc | 1,978 | Peter, what's your reading of dealer attitudes these days? | 11 |
fomc | 1,978 | I'd say it's one of great caution, with no great conviction about an immediate change of policy. There's a feeling that because of the performance of the aggregates and the economy no early move toward firming is likely. They are very much aware of the international situation. I think if that cloud were not hanging ove... | 140 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.