James Bullard on FAIT, Nominal GDP Targeting, and the Fed’s Upcoming Framework Review

Macro Musings with David Beckworth

James Bullard was the president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis from 2008 to 2023, and he is currently the dean of the Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. School of Business at Purdue University. James is also a previous guest of the show, and he rejoins David on Macro Musings to talk about his time at the Fed, FAIT, and the upcoming Fed framework review. Specifically, James and David also discuss how to improve the FOMC’s economic reporting, the case for implementing nominal GDP targeting, the future of R-star, and much more.

Transcript for this week’s episode.

James’s St. Louis Fed bio

James’s Purdue University profile

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Related Links:

*R-Star Wars: The Phantom Menace* - A presentation by James Bullard at the 34th Annual National Association for Business Economics (NABE) Economic Policy Conference

*Demand Shocks as Technology Shocks* by Yan Bai, Jose-Victor Rios-Rull, and Kjetil Storesletten

Timestamps:

(00:00:00) – Intro

(00:03:10) – Defining the St. Louis Fed and Bullard’s Fed Tenure

(00:09:58) – Comparing FAIT and Nominal GDP Targeting

(00:15:55) – Assessing the Current FAIT Framework

(00:25:37) – Evaluating the Recent V-Shaped Recovery

(00:29:28) – What to Expect from the Upcoming Fed Framework Review

(00:33:31) – Improving the FOMC’s Economic Reporting

(00:37:46) – The Case for Nominal GDP Targeting

(00:50:24) – The Future of R-Star

(00:53:52) – Outro