Peter's Blog

New Insights from the Fed’s Meeting Minutes: Market Expects Rate Cuts

Minutes from the Federal Open Market Committee’s June 17–18 meeting show policymakers content to hold their fire—for now. The Fed kept its benchmark federal-funds range at 4¼–4½ percent and left both the interest rate on reserve balances (4.4 percent) and the primary-credit rate (4.5 percent) untouched. Officials insisted that “recent indicators suggest that economic activity […]

ADP Logs Surprise 33,000 Job Drop 

Hiring hit the brakes in June, with the ADP National Employment Report showing U.S. private-sector payrolls shrinking by 33,000 positions—the first monthly contraction of 2025. Goods makers managed to eke out modest gains, but service industries bled jobs, and small businesses took the biggest hit. Wages, meanwhile, kept climbing faster than the official inflation gauges, […]

Inflated Dreams: How the Fed Blew Up Housing Costs

Consumer confidence remains in the dumps, thanks in large part to rising prices in essential goods and services like housing. Contrary to the Trump administration’s preference for lower interest rates, the solution to the housing affordability crisis is to end the Fed, which created and still sustains the problem.

Powell Stalls, Tariffs Loom, and Consumers Turn Gloomy

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told the House Financial Services Committee on Tuesday that the central bank is in no rush to move interest rates, even as fresh tariffs cloud the outlook and inflation remains sticky. “For the time being, we are well positioned to wait to learn more about the likely course of the […]

Fed Critics’ Three Central-Banking Myths

Some free-marketers mistakenly believe that the Federal Reserve would be more effective if it operated in a different political environment or had more resources to control the monetary supply. Instead, as the Austrian school emphasizes, the problem is with central banking per se. Central planning never works, especially when the planning is over the money […]

New Policy Report: Fed has Bad News for Congress

In a report released on Friday, the Fed provided a monetary policy update to congress, highlighting its perspective on keeping rates constant and its outlook on the future of the economy. The report comes after the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) kept its federal-funds-rate target locked at 4¼ %–4½ % for a sixth straight meeting […]

Fed’s Harker Warns Tariff Risks, Debt Threaten Economic Stability in Farewell Speech

Delivering his final public remarks as President and CEO of the Philadelphia Federal Reserve on yesterday, Patrick T. Harker urged caution regarding inflation, tariff policies, and rising national debt, highlighting enduring challenges to U.S. economic stability. The speech occurred at the Philadelphia Fed, marking the culmination of Harker’s tenure before his scheduled retirement at month-end. […]

The Fed Drops QT to $5B a Month – Ensuring the Balance Sheet Will Stay Bloated

The following analysis breaks down the Fed balance sheet in detail. It shows different parts of the balance sheet and how those amounts have changed. It also shows historical interest rate trends.

Blueprint for Dismantling the Fed

Austrian economists agree that the Fed drives both inflation and the business cycle and is accordingly responsible for the Great Recession and our current economy. Given the Fed’s current policy path and America’s political climate, what’s the best way to end the Fed?

Consumer Confidence Plunges as Recession Signs Multiply

U.S. consumer confidence suffered a sharp blow yesterday, plummeting 7.2 points to 92.9, according to the latest data from the Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index. Alarmingly, the Expectations Index, which measures consumers’ short-term outlook on the economy, tumbled to 65.2—its lowest level in 12 years—breaking well below the critical 80-point threshold that traditionally signals an […]