The Recovery from the Great Recession: Did the FOMC Learn the Right Lessons?

Abstract

In August 2020, monetary policymakers articulated a new framework for conducting monetary policy. That framework reflected the conclusion, drawn from the recovery from the Great Recession, that monetary policy had erred in pursuing preemptive increases in the funds rate. Starting in December 2015, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) had raised the funds rate off the zero lower bound and the inflation rate continued to run below the 2 percent target. Going forward, the FOMC will forgo preemptive increases to ensure an overshoot of its inflation target until the FOMC achieves the goal of “maximum employment.” What should policymakers have learned from the Great Recession recovery? It was a period of considerable nominal and real stability. In part, that stability was an artifact of an initial moderately contractionary monetary policy that limited the strength of the recovery. But that price stability provided the foundation for the significant decline in the unemployment rate during the recovery.

Keywords: Federal Reserve System, monetary policy, inflation, COVID-19, Federal Open Market Committee, FOMC, employment

JEL Classification: E5