As part of its annual organizational meeting actions, the Federal Open Market Committee reaffirmed its "Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy Strategy," with a revision to clarify that it views its inflation objective as symmetric, and with an updated reference to participants' estimates of the longer-run normal unemployment rate in the most recent Summary of Economic Projections (December 2015).
In October 2014, in preparation for the annual reaffirmation, the Committee discussed the potential benefits of amending the statement to clarify that its inflation objective is symmetric. As indicated in the minutes of that meeting, there was general agreement on the symmetry of the objective. Following further Committee discussion regarding the most appropriate way to express this clarification, the statement has been amended to indicate that the "Committee would be concerned if inflation were running persistently above or below" its 2 percent objective. All but one participant supported the amended statement.
The Committee first adopted the statement at its January 2012 meeting and has reaffirmed it, with appropriate revisions, at its annual organizational meetings each January.
Voting for the statement were: Janet L. Yellen, Chair; William C. Dudley, Vice Chairman; Lael Brainard; Stanley Fischer; Esther L. George; Loretta J. Mester; Jerome H. Powell; Eric Rosengren; and Daniel K. Tarullo. Voting against was James Bullard, who agreed the Committee's inflation goal is symmetric, but believed the amended language is not sufficiently focused on expected future deviations of inflation from the goal.
Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy Strategy (PDF) Amended Jan. 26, 2016 Previous version: Statement on Longer-Run Goals and Monetary Policy Strategy (PDF) Amended Jan. 27, 2015
