The Wholly Fallible Ben Bernanke

by Dean Baker

Many have noted the resemblance between the Federal Reserve Board and the Catholic church. Both have long traditions of secret convocations: meetings of the open market committee and the College of Cardinals. Both have a revered leader: the chairman of the board of governors and the pope. And both have claims to infallibility.

OK, it is only the pope who can explicitly claim infallibility. In the case of the Fed chair, infallibility is bestowed by the business reporters and politicians who treat every word from the reigning Fed chair as a priceless pearl of wisdom.

This aura of infallibility is especially painful in the current economic situation when error seems to be the new religion of the Fed. Just to remind everyone – since so much denial has dominated the debate – the only reason that we are facing near double-digit unemployment and the worst economic calamity in 70 years is that the Fed was out to lunch in combating the housing bubble.