Survey of Business Uncertainty: Preventing Overcorrection
Atlanta Fed president Raphael Bostic discusses how real-time intelligence from the survey is vital in a rapidly evolving economic environment.

Transcript

Nick Parker: Raphael, what do you look for to prevent overcorrection as frequently tightening cycles lead to recession?

Raphael Bostic: We look to you guys. We want you guys to tell us when things are really changing. Look, the whole point of what we're trying to do through the surveys and through our outreach, we have a regional economic information network, is get real-time intelligence about what's going on. The surveys and your responses really give us true and important insights as to how close to the edge we are and what's the likelihood of our going over the edge and pulling everybody into a more uncomfortable position. I think that stuff is really important, aside from the usual measures like yield curves and all the things that people have pointed to for a long time.

In today's environment, particularly in today's environment, when things are evolving so rapidly, it's going to be responses from people who participate in this survey and others that are going to give us that initial glimpse. For me, I feel like we're well-positioned because you guys are going to keep doing this stuff and tell us what you know, and it will get us to a place where we'll know when we're getting close and we'll be able to moderate our approach to make sure that doesn't happen.