Fed Chair Powell: Because the U.S. Economy Is Strong ‘We Have the Ability to Take Our Time and Get This Right’

EXCERPT:

POWELL: "So, we’re actually, on a 12-month basis, we’re actually at 2.6, both headline and core for inflation. That’s — that represents really significant progress. I think we peaked at 5.4% in core, and the same thing happened in headline. We’ve gone from 7.1 to 2.6. So, yes, we’ve made a lot of progress: We wanted — we just want to understand that the levels that we’re seeing are a true reading on what is actually happening with underlying inflation. And as we were saying at the last part of last year, people were saying, 'You need to declare victory, this is over,' and then we had a quarter of inflation which was well above 3%. So, we want to be more confident and, frankly, because the U.S. economy is strong and the labor market is strong, we have the ability to take our time and get this right now. That’s what we’re planning to do."