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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Bernanke challenged on inflation


Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke testifies Thursday. 
 (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)
Associated Press The Spokesman-Review

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the House Financial Services Committee took aim Thursday at the Federal Reserve’s belief that inflation rather than slow growth poses the greatest risk to the economy.

Rep. Barney Frank told Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke he was a “little puzzled” by Bernanke’s position, arguing that prospects of slower growth seemed to him to be equally as important a risk as the possibility of a flare-up of inflation.

Frank, D-Mass., said he found the central bank’s identification of inflation as the bigger risk “troubling.”

Bernanke, appearing before Frank’s panel to deliver the Fed’s semiannual report to Congress, defended the Fed’s assessment of the inflation threat. “Inflation needs to be well controlled” for the economic expansion to continue, the Fed chairman insisted.

The tense exchange was a tiny bump in an otherwise smooth and cordial hearing where Bernanke fielded wide-ranging questions on the nation’s record-high trade deficit, trade competition from China, concerns about widening economic inequality between high- and low-income workers, and the strain on the country’s balance sheets with a massive wave of retiring baby boomers.

It was the second day in a row that Bernanke was on Capitol Hill giving lawmakers a review of the economy. On Wednesday, he offered senators a mostly upbeat assessment of country’s economic prospects, citing improvements in inflation and housing.

Many economists viewed those remarks as suggesting the Fed will leave interest rates alone for a while.

The Fed has held a key interest rate steady at 5.25 percent since August, giving borrowers a reprieve. Before that, the central bank steadily had raised rates for two years, the longest ever stretch of increases, to fend off inflation.

Still, Bernanke on Wednesday and again Thursday made clear that the threat of inflation is the bigger risk to the economy in the Fed’s mind. That’s why Bernanke and his Fed colleagues are holding open the possibility of further rate increases in the event that inflation takes an unexpected turn for the worse.

“If inflation becomes higher for some reason, the Federal Reserve has to respond to that by raising interest rates,” the Fed chairman said Thursday.