美联储官员鲍威尔周四表示，虽然通货膨胀达到了预期，但生产力增长缓慢可能会将利率维持在大萧条时期的利率水平之下。
最近几周，加息问题再度成为热议话题，美联储官员杰罗姆·鲍威尔便就这一问题发表了评论。但他没有阻止投资者对加息的预测。
他说：“如果后续的数据能够继续支撑这一预期，那么美联储加息的时机便不再遥远。”他认为，第二季度增长强劲、就业率增加、失业率减少、收入增加，这些都是极其重要的。
鲍威尔在演讲中强调了长期经济趋势。他认为近来的生产数据疲软主要归咎于需求疲软以及技术创新的缺失。劳动力供应不足也会降低潜在的产出，但最近的数据有所回升。
他说，在危机期间，长期潜在增长率已由3%降至2%。
潜在产出增长率过低会阻碍加息的进程。虽然产出差距已被弥补，通胀水平也回复到2%，但当前利率仍低于危机前水平。
鲍威尔表示，近来的证据表明，经济衰退造成的影响是持久的。分析家们用三分之一的时间强调：没有永远的供应危机；又用三分之一的时间来强调：正在减少的是潜在产出水平而不是增长率；还用剩下的三分之一的时间强调：潜在产出水平和增长率都在减少。
他说：“不幸的是，种种现象表明，美国可能会进入衰退期。”
Fed’s Powell: Interest-rate hike may come soon, but weak productivity will cap increases
Slower productivity growth may keep interest rates below where they stood before the Great Recession even after inflation returns to its target, a top Federal Reserve official said Thursday.
The comments from Fed. Gov. Jerome Powell, to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, come as the interest-rate debate has heated up in recent weeks. Powell did nothing to curb expectations of a rate increase this summer.
“If incoming data continue to support those expectations, I would see it as appropriate to continue to gradually raise the federal-funds rate. Depending on the incoming data and the evolving risks, another rate increase may be appropriate fairly soon,” Powell said.
He said it would be important to see a strengthening of growth in the second quarter along with “strong” job growth, further reductions in the unemployment rate and other measures of slack, and increases in wages.
Powell devoted much of his speech to longer-term economic trends. He discussed recent weak productivity numbers, which he blamed both on a weak recovery in demand as well as a lack of technological innovation. He said a low labor supply also has held back potential output, but recent data on that front is more encouraging.
He said estimates of long-run potential growth have dropped from about 3% to 2% since the crisis.
“Lower potential output growth would mean that interest rates will remain below their precrisis levels even after the output gap is fully closed and inflation returns to 2%,” said Powell.
Powell said recent evidence is that the recession has left behind lasting damage. He said analysis suggests that a third of the time, there’s no permanent supply-side damage; a third of the time, there’s a reduction in the level of potential output but not the growth rate; and a third of the time, there’s a reduction in both the level of output and the growth rate.
“Unfortunately, recent experience suggests that the United States is at risk of falling in the last category,” he said.
本文翻译由兄弟财经提供
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