Federal Reserve Keeps Interest Rates Steady for Fifth Meeting in a Row

In support of our goals, today, the Federal Open Market Committee decided to leave our policy interest rate unchanged. We believe that the current stance of monetary policy leaves us well positioned to respond in a timely way to potential economic developments. The majority view was still what it has been, which is that inflation is running above target. Maximum employment is right at target. That means policy — policy should be a little bit restrictive. Two of our members felt that the time had come to cut. It’s an unusual situation where you have risks to both your employment mandate and your inflation mandate. That’s the nature of a supply shock. And it’s probably not surprising that there would be differences and different perspectives on that.