Ben Bernanke
Ben Bernanke
Ben Shalom Bernankeis an American economist at the Brookings Institution who served two terms as chairman of the Federal Reserve, the central bank of the United States, from 2006 to 2014. During his tenure as chairman, Bernanke oversaw the Federal Reserve's response to the late-2000s financial crisis. Before becoming Federal Reserve chairman, Bernanke was a tenured professor at Princeton University and chaired the department of economics there from 1996 to September 2002, when he went on public service leave...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth13 December 1953
CityAugusta, GA
CountryUnited States of America
If Australia finds it has a strong Australian dollar, and it has higher unemployment, then it would have to respond, and that would either be by increasing domestic demand or by weakening its own currency.
I do not subscribe to any rigid and mechanical rule ... I intend to be flexible and to learn from experience.
I am going to begin now a practice of not making recommendations on specific tax and spending proposals.
I believe that the Federal Reserve's success in reducing and stabilizing inflation and inflation expectations is a major reason for this improved economic performance.
But again, I remain optimistic that the impact on energy from these two events will be limited.
Obviously, I haven't succeeded in defusing the political concerns about the Fed.
Low marginal tax rates are supportive of economic growth. I would submit that we would want to look very hard at government spending - make sure it's controlled - before we raise taxes, which, in turn, would have negative impacts on the economy.
Many savers are also homeowners; indeed, a family's home may be its most important financial asset. Many savers are working, or would like to be.
Sector-specific price declines, uncomfortable as they may be for producers in that sector, are generally not a problem for the economy as a whole and do not constitute deflation.
So far, the effects appear to be relatively modest on growth.
So far, the actual actions taken have been relatively modest, but there is some hope, I think, that, going forward, these actions will advance further and we will see more progress in the current account.
Since World War II, inflation - the apparently inexorable rise in the prices of goods and services - has been the bane of central bankers.
My first priority will be to maintain continuing with the policy and policy strategies under the Greenspan era.
One may aspire to succeed Chairman Greenspan but it will not be possible to replace him,