Greenspan speaks...

Henry C.K. Liu hliu at mindspring.com
Tue Feb 23 11:35:28 PST 1999


Don't forget this is Humphrey-Hawkins testimony which is supposed to be the Fed Chairman's justification to Congress how he has met or intends to meet policy aims of Humphrey-Hawkins. So between the lines, its not unusual for Greenspan to imply that those aims are economically inconsistent and simply bad policy in general, using the latest data as his ammunition. This is why he sounds inconsistent, because he uses the data selectively to justify hios ideology. The key phrase is alway: "the balance of risk." In answer to Committee (Democrat) Vice Chairman's question on persistent low skill unemployment, for example, Greenspan gives the pat answer of job training. So he blames the victims rather than the economic system.

Henry

Doug Henwood wrote:


> jf noonan wrote:
>
> >And last time around, it was just the neato way the Market is supposed
> >to work. Will ever make up his mind?
>
> Greenspan's discourse is not unlike Freud's dreamwork: contradictions are
> presented in sequence rather than worked out simultaneously. So, Greenspan
> will contradict himself from month to month, or even paragraph to
> paragraph. All along, he's been worried about the contradictions between
> global deflation/crisis and domestic "overheating." I think what's happened
> is that the international financial scene has settled down enough that he
> can start worrying about the excessively low unemployment rate and the
> excessively high stock market again. This week.
>
> Doug



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