The risk that the economy has entered a substantial downturn appears to have diminished over the past month or so.

I assure this committee that, if I am confirmed, I will be strictly independent of all political influences... essential to that institution's ability to function effectively and achieve its mandated objectives.

We do not expect significant spillovers from the subprime market to the rest of the economy or to the financial system.

A money-financed tax cut is essentially equivalent to Milton Friedman's famous 'helicopter drop' of money.

September and October of 2008 was the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression.

Like gold, U.S. dollars have value only to the extent that they are strictly limited in supply. But the U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost. By increasing the number of U.S. dollars in circulation, or even by credibly threatening to do so, the U.S. government can also reduce the value of a dollar in terms of goods and services, which is equivalent to raising the prices in dollars of those goods and services.

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.