Federal Reserve - Monetary Policy

Monetary Policy

Further information: Monetary policy of the United States

The term "monetary policy" refers to the actions undertaken by a central bank, such as the Federal Reserve, to influence the availability and cost of money and credit to help promote national economic goals. What happens to money and credit affects interest rates (the cost of credit) and the performance of an economy. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 gave the Federal Reserve authority to set monetary policy in the United States.

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Famous quotes containing the words monetary and/or policy:

    In our time, the curse is monetary illiteracy, just as inability to read plain print was the curse of earlier centuries.
    Ezra Pound (1885–1972)

    Will mankind never learn that policy is not morality,—that it never secures any moral right, but considers merely what is expedient? chooses the available candidate,—who is invariably the devil,—and what right have his constituents to be surprised, because the devil does not behave like an angel of light? What is wanted is men, not of policy, but of probity,—who recognize a higher law than the Constitution, or the decision of the majority.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)