The ultimate purpose of economics, of course, is to understand and promote the enhancement of well-being.

Economics has many substantive areas of knowledge where there is agreement, but also contains areas of controversy. That's inescapable.

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.

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.'

When the economic well-being of their nation demanded a strong and creative response, my colleagues at the Federal Reserve... mustered the moral courage to do what was necessary.

Of course, economic forecasts must be revised when new information arrives and are thus necessarily provisional.