Quote from piezoe:
I really don't know. I do know this however: The Fed does not want deflation. I think most can agree that in a debtor nation such as the U.S. where there is extensive public and private debt, deflation would have the effect of increasing the cost of borrowing retroactively, as dollars paid on debts would have more purchasing power than the dollars borrowed. From a debtors point of view that is a very bad thing, particularly if the public debt is held by other nations. It seems the intention is to inflate away as much debt as possible, as mentioned by Bob111, I think.
Bernanke and the Fed are reacting to a difficult situation caused by a combination of bad government policy, deficit spending, and a former Fed Chairman who, while he was the chief regulator, did not believe in regulation. Greenspan's idea that the market would take care of excesses without intervention and without major upheaval has been thoroughly discredited. The jury is still out on Bernanke, but so far I find him a breath of fresh air after Greenspan's mumbo jumbo. Mary Shapiro seems to be at least trying to move the SEC in the right direction, and also seems to be a considerable improvement over Cox, who also, in retrospect, seemed to be asleep at the switch.
I don't understand those that don't want an independent central bank. And it baffles me when they extole what they believe are the virtues of a market controlled economy without direction or interference from the central bank. Under Chairman Greenspan we had a Central Bank that provided excessive liquidity for too long, and total non-interference with the market, and look what that led to! Greenspan ignored all of the many warnings he was repeatedly given regarding excesses and laxness in mortgage. And when he was asked about raising the margin requirement he opined that that would be ineffective in cooling the market. Later event proved him to be entirely wrong -- as one of the important contributing factors to the meltdown was excessive leverage. I won't be surprised if Greenspan is not remembered in history as one of the very worst Fed Chairman.