Transcript
Paula Tkac: Having economists around in a research department helps a policymaker—our Bank president, in this case—make those decisions with the most information possible. It means that there are a group of us in every Bank, to have robust conversations about the consequences of potential actions. And we disagree, and that conversation, hearing the disagreements, I think, is what ultimately helps a policymaker sort out the risks of any particular decision.
It’s fun for me to do research. It’s fun for me to be an economist, to learn new things and to do the work that I do for the Federal Reserve System to help us understand the economy. But it’s also incredibly gratifying to know that that work may, in some small way, help a better decision get made, and will contribute, hopefully, to the stability and resilience of the U.S. economy.