If two people always agree, one of them is redundant.
Ben Bernanke
The lesson of history is that you do not get a sustained economic recovery as long as the financial system is in crisis.
No economy can succeed without a high-quality workforce, particularly in an age of globalization and technical change.
Importantly, in the 1930s, in the Great Depression, the Federal Reserve, despite its mandate, was quite passive and, as a result, financial crisis became very severe, lasted essentially from 1929 to 1933.
The best solution to income inequality is providing a high-quality education for everybody. In our highly technological, globalized economy, people without education will not be able to improve their economic situation.
In many spheres of human endeavor, from science to business to education to economic policy, good decisions depend on good measurement.
Smart financial planning - such as budgeting, saving for emergencies, and preparing for retirement - can help households enjoy better lives while weathering financial shocks. Financial education can play a key role in getting to these outcomes.
Income inequality is troubling because, among other things, it means that many people in our society don't have the opportunities to advance themselves.
If you want to understand geology, study earthquakes. If you want to understand the economy, study the Depression.
Home purchases that are very highly leveraged or unaffordable subject the borrower and lender to a great deal of risk. Moreover, even in a strong economy, unforeseen life events and risks in local real estate markets make highly leveraged borrowers vulnerable.
As an educator myself, I understand the profound effect that good teachers and a quality education have on the lives of our young people.
I think most of us would agree that people who have, say, little formal schooling but labor honestly and diligently to help feed, clothe, and educate their families are deserving of greater respect - and help, if necessary - than many people who are superficially more successful.
Monetary policy is a blunt tool which certainly affects the distribution of income and wealth, although whether the net effect is to increase or reduce inequality is not clear.
Textbooks describe economics as the study of the allocation of scarce resources. That definition may be the 'what,' but it certainly is not the 'why.'
Developments in financial markets can have broad economic effects felt by many outside the markets.
The central bank needs to be able to make policy without short term political concerns.
Identity theft is a serious crime that affects millions of Americans each year.
In fact, the world needs more nerds.
The failure of Lehman Brothers demonstrated that liquidity provision by the Federal Reserve would not be sufficient to stop the crisis; substantial fiscal resources were necessary.
Stronger regulation and supervision aimed at problems with underwriting practices and lenders' risk management would have been a more effective and surgical approach to constraining the housing bubble than a general increase in interest rates.
History proves... that a smart central bank can protect the economy and the financial sector from the nastier side effects of a stock market collapse.
Only a strong economy can create higher asset values and sustainably good returns for savers.
Because financially capable consumers ultimately contribute to a stable economic and financial system as well as improve their own financial situations, it's clear that the Federal Reserve has a significant stake in financial education.
Fostering transparency and accountability at the Federal Reserve was one of my principal objectives when I became Chairman in February 2006.
As you know, in the latter part of 2008 and early 2009, the Federal Reserve took extraordinary steps to provide liquidity and support credit market functioning, including the establishment of a number of emergency lending facilities and the creation or extension of currency swap agreements with 14 central banks around the world.
I think one of the lessons of the Depression - and this is something that Franklin Roosevelt demonstrated - was that when orthodoxy fails, then you need to try new things. And he was very willing to try unorthodox approaches when the orthodox approach had shown that it was not adequate.
In a mature economy like India's, which is becoming modern and a financially-oriented economy, an independent central bank, responsible central bank, is really central to success.
As we try to make the financial system safer, we must inevitably confront the problem of moral hazard.
There are limits to monetary policy.
The more guidance a central bank can provide the public about how policy is likely to evolve the greater the chance that market participants will make appropriate inferences.
The Mexican debt crisis, Latin American debt crisis, the crises of the 1990s, the Wall Street stock market crash, and other events should have reminded us, and did remind us, that financial instability remains a concern, remains a problem.
The Fed's independence is critical.
Clear communication is always important in central banking, but it can be especially important when economic conditions call for further policy stimulus but the policy rate is already at its effective lower bound.
The Federal Reserve, like other central banks, wields powerful tools; democratic accountability requires that the public be able to see how and for what purposes those tools are being used.
Deflation can be particularly dangerous when a financial system is shaky, with household and corporate balance sheets in poor shape and banks undercapitalized and heavily burdened with bad loans.
The Libor system is structurally flawed. It is a major problem for our financial system and for the confidence in the financial system. We need to address it.
The economist John Maynard Keynes said that in the long run, we are all dead. If he were around today he might say that, in the long run, we are all on Social Security and Medicare.
The ultimate purpose of economics, of course, is to understand and promote the enhancement of well-being.
Long term, I have a lot of confidence in the United States. We have an excellent record in terms of innovation. We have great universities that are involved in technological change and progress. We have an entrepreneurial culture, much more than almost any other country.
To minimize market uncertainty and achieve the maximum effect of its policies, the Federal Reserve is committed to providing the public as much information as possible about the uses of its balance sheet, plans regarding future uses of its balance sheet, and the criteria on which the relevant decisions are based.
The American people are among the most productive in the world. We have the best technologies. We have great universities. We have entrepreneurs.
You want to put the fire out first and then worry about the fire code.
Preventing liquidation of an unbalanced market will leave you in tears.
Uncertainty is seen to retard investment independently of considerations of risk or expected return.
In the past, Federal Reserve chairmen have not generally gone directly to the public.
Imperfect substitutability of assets implies that changes in the supplies of various assets available to private investors may affect the prices and yields of those assets.
The Federal Reserve Act requires the Federal Reserve to report annually on its operations and to publish its balance sheet weekly.
Well, the U.S., of course, is the world's largest economy. It's about a quarter of the world's output. It's also home to many of the largest financial institutions and financial markets.
When historical relationships are taken into account, it is difficult to ascribe the house price bubble either to monetary policy or to the broader macroeconomic environment.
Our mission, as set forth by the Congress is a critical one: to preserve price stability, to foster maximum sustainable growth in output and employment, and to promote a stable and efficient financial system that serves all Americans well and fairly.
