Analyzing Fed Policymaking 1996-1998 Term Paper

Analyzing Fed Policy devising 1996-1998 - Term Paper ExampleWith upward rising of the aggregate, thither are favorable conditions to drive economical growth such as high job creation, high production, and business expansion. The Federal Reserve policies among 1996 and 1998 were aimed at stimulating growth in ensuring increased productivity, which resulted in increased employment and reduced inflationary rates through control of interest rates. A paper by Federal Reserve Board (1999) showed that, economic growth between 1996 and 1998 was remarkable and stronger than many had expected. The delivery growth was more than 3.5% in 1997 and between 2.5 and 3.0 % in 1998. By 1998 the real GDP growth was at 3.5%, and was expected to rise further in the following years (Lewis, 1998). According to Lewis, at the start of October 1998, the S& P was abnormally high having risen from about 1000 in earlier years to about 1400 by July 1999. The Fed had to impose a 40% increase in the S &P by hiki ng interest rates from 4.75 to about 6.5 in the following years. This rise resulted from an irrational exuberance where too more money was being injected into the booming internet and technology industries (Lewis, 1998). Figure 1 portrays the general trend of interest rates during this period, Figure 2 portrays the relations between money supply and price levels between 1950 and 2008, while figure 3 shows the dollar performance compared to Germans in 1998. The major driver of the U.S economy that resulted in a high economic growth between 1996 and 1998 was capital spending. Many organizations continued to invest heavily in information technology and modernizing intercourse equipment to improve their productivity (Lewis, 1998). The market interest rates affect borrowing and lending policies, which affect the production and consumption of goods, products and services. The Federal Reserve Board (1999) explains that, these factors by and large influence employment and job creation hig h interest rates will discourage investors hence low job creation opportunities. For example, during this period, Fed immovable not to hike the interest rates to control the exponential market growth in preventing the economy from tending to inflation. This is observed in graph 1. In the year 1996, it was expected that inflation and interest rates would be on the rise towards the end of that year, but it turned otherwise (Federal Reserve Board, 1999). As Mishkin (115) explains, the implore for money and interest rates are inversely related using the opportunity cost aspect. This is the expected return sacrificed by an investor by not place the alternative asset, which refers to a bond in this case. Moreover, demand for money is determined by the wealth or income and the price levels in the market (Mishkin, 116). The federal liberty polices during this period were aimed at robust growth in employment, recovery and strengthening of the dollar, and regulated interest rates, which i ncreased wealth and lowered the interest rates making the demand of money to increase. There was a general fall of the domestic interest rates and national debts over this period (Mishkin, 11). In the third tush of 1998, uproar in financial market globally resulted in a sharp drop in value of the dollar, having dropped from DM 1.7993 to DM 1.6718, which could have shifted the economic growth as well as interest rate policies towards encouraging more borrowing. Low interest rates contributed