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A Fed for Next Time: Ideas for a Crisis‐​Ready Central Bank

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Featuring Sir Paul Tucker, chair of the Systemic Risk Council and former deputy governor of the Bank of England; Elga Bartsch, Head of Macro Research, BlackRock; Peter Stella, former Head of the International Monetary Fund’s Central Banking and Monetary and Foreign Exchange Operations Divisions; Peter Conti‐​Brown, Assistant Professor, The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania; and more.

How Will the Fed Fight the Next Crisis?

In just a dozen years, the Federal Reserve has faced two severe crises. And twice it has responded by leaning heavily on emergency lending powers it seldom used before by improvising temporary lending programs and taking part in fiscal policy.

In the meantime, the Fed’s nonemergency lending facilities have hardly changed, and may well prove insufficient when the Fed faces its next crisis.

The implication of this is both obvious and ominous: while we still count on the Fed to deal with crises, we no longer know how it will deal with them. Instead of being predictable, the Fed’s crisis‐​prevention methods have become unpredictable–and controversial–adding to, instead of allaying, economic scrutiny.

Can we do better? Can we improve the Fed’s systematic response to crises, making that response both more effective and more predictable? Can we thereby limit the Fed’s entanglement in politics? What can the Fed do to promote these ends? What might Congress do?

For some expert answers, please join us for a joint Cato Institute–Mercatus Center at George Mason University virtual conference series, A Fed for Next Time: Ideas for a Crisis‐​Ready Central Bank, hosted by George Selgin and David Beckworth.

PROGRAM

June 16, 2020

1:00-2:00 PM

PANEL 1: REFORMING CREDIT POLICY



Sir Paul Tucker, chair of the Systemic Risk Council and former Deputy Governor of the Bank of England

Kathryn Judge, Harvey J. Goldschmid Professor of Law, Columbia Law School

Lev Menand, Academic Fellow and Lecturer in Law, Columbia Law School


Moderator: Jeanna Smialek, Federal Reserve and Economics Reporter, The New York Times

June 18, 2020

1:00-2:00 PM

PANEL 2: DEFINING FISCAL STIMULUS DUTIES



Peter Conti‐​Brown, Assistant Professor, The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania

Elga Bartsch, Head of Macro Research, BlackRock

Joseph Mason, Russell B. Long Professor of Finance, Louisiana State University


Moderator: Chris Condon, Federal Reserve Reporter, Bloomberg News

June 23, 2020

1:00-2:00 PM

PANEL 3: MODERNIZING LIQUIDITY PROVISION



David Andolfatto, Senior Vice President, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

William Nelson, Executive Vice President and Chief Economist, Bank Policy Institute

Jeremy Kronick, Associate Director, Research at the C.D. Howe Institute


Moderator: Jeff Cox, Finance Editor, CNBC

June 25, 2020

1:00-2:00 PM

PANEL 4: PRESERVING MONETARY AUTONOMY



Peter Stella, former head of the International Monetary Fund’s Central Banking and Monetary and Foreign Exchange Operations Divisions

George Selgin, Director, Cato Institute Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives

Sebastian Edwards, Henry Ford II Professor of International Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles


Moderator: Victoria Guida, Financial Services Reporter, Politico