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Americans Scaling a Mountain of Credit Card Debt
Inflation caught economic experts by surprise. What else are they missing?
“Why We Missed On Inflation, and Implications for Monetary Policy Going Forward,” wrote Neel Kashkari frankly for Medium on January 4, 2023.
Medium is an excellent place to explore complex issues in great detail and the economic expert didn’t hold back.
Mr. Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, is one of the rare economists willing to issue an unqualified mea culpa for joining the “Inflation is transitory!” deflectors who initially ignored the warning signs so many of their colleagues noticed.
“As I’ve discussed publicly for some time, I have been trying to make sense of the mixed signals the economy is sending,” Kashkari began, echoing a sentiment many Americans share.
Why, for instance, are some economic indicators — like low unemployment — so persistently positive while so many other economic indicators — like non-transitory inflation — are so negative?
“Nonfarm payrolls rose 223,000 in December, as strong jobs market tops expectations,” announced CNBC triumphantly on January 6, 2023. Meanwhile, news like “Stock Market Losses Grow In Sour Start To 2023; Tesla Crashes 13%; Apple Hits 52-Week Low,” and, “Amazon will lay off more than…