Former Fed Official : ' Even excluding the Great Depression, real output has been no more stable than in the pre-Fed era. '

Former Dallas Fed official Gerald P. O’Driscoll reports on the failure of the Federal Reserve:

There are those who likely don’t see the need for reform, but a look a the Fed’s unenviable performance over the past one hundred years shows how clearly its needed. On its watch, America endured the Great Depression, the Great Inflation and the Great Recession. Even excluding the Great Depression, real output has been no more stable than in the pre-Fed era.

In fact, the years of monetary stability under the Fed have been comparatively few. There was a period of notable prosperity in the 1920s, where the Fed was constrained by the post-war, modified gold standard and benefitted by the sound economic and fiscal policies of the Harding and Coolidge administrations. Then, inflation remained low after the end of the Korean War. While some attribute that to the Fed’s acquiring independence from the Treasury, it was more due more to President Eisenhower’s aversion to deficit spending that anything else.

Price fixing always fails.