Fed Minutes indicate little reason to raise interest rates in June
Posted By RichC on May 20, 2015
The Federal Reserve officials doubted they would be ready to raise short-term interest rates by midyear, according to minutes of the meeting released Wednesday.
Fed officials, along with most economists, are struggling to make sense of a first-quarter economic slowdown. The normal pattern of post-recession growth has been non-existent as job growth has been tepid to say the least. Businesses facing a sluggish economy and piles of new regulations and health care changes passed to them by Affordable Health Care (Obamacare), has many employers reluctant to add staff until the need is assured.
As for the Fed governors, many “at the April 28-29 policy meeting believed temporary factors were holding the economy back.” Before lifting rates, they want to be confident growth is on track, unemployment will keep falling and inflation will gradually rise toward their 2% goal.
Notes from an afternoon WSJ News Alert
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