Business Week's "Fed’s Bullard Says U.S. Is ‘About to Turn the Corner’ on Jobs" Article

"March 22 (Bloomberg) -- James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, said the nation’s job market is “about to turn the corner” after the deepest slump since the Great Depression.

“We’re about to turn the corner on jobs,” Bullard said today in an interview with CNBC. “I think we’ll get some good months of jobs reports coming up very, very soon. We’re looking for March to be strong.”

Bullard repeated his view that the central bank’s pledge to keep rates low for an “extended period,” affirmed last week, creates the perception policy makers have a specific date in mind for increasing borrowing costs.

“The extended period language is putting us in a box,” he said. “People are interpreting that as a date certain when we will raise rates.”

The Fed will hold the target rate for overnight loans between banks at its current range of zero to 0.25 percent through the first nine months of the year, according to the survey median. The rate will rise to 0.75 percentage point by the end of the year.

Bullard said he expects a “reasonable” economic recovery, though not a “roaring recovery.”

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said last month the U.S. economy is in a “nascent” recovery that still requires low interest rates to encourage demand by consumers and businesses once federal stimulus fades."

Wellisz, Christopher. Fed’s Bullard Says U.S. Is ‘About to Turn the Corner’ on Jobs. Business Week. 2010 Mar 22 [cited 2010 Mar 22]. Available at http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-22/fed-s-bullard-says-u-s-is-about-to-turn-the-corner-on-jobs.html