Narayana Kocherlakota

Rochester economist Narayana Kocherlakota explains the difference between the two—and why fiscal policy in the form of stimulus checks for all adults comes out ahead.

Rochester economist Narayana Kocherlakota says a return to 1970s levels of inflation is unlikely—but offers a cautionary note.

Narayana Kocherlakota, the Lionel W. McKenzie Professor of Economics, says the prospects for economic recovery depend on how effectively we can combat COVID-19.

In advance of this week's Fed meeting, Kocherlakota calls on the Fed to prohibit banks from paying dividends to shareholders. "Banks should be keeping as much capital as they can," he says.

Without a coordinated system of testing, tracing, and quarantining for COVID-19, economic activity cannot resume—and the downturn will be steeper and longer than any since before World War II, says Rochester economist Narayana Kocherlakota.

The $2 trillion stimulus plan working its way through Congress likely won’t be adequate to save the US economy from recession in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, says University of Rochester economist Narayana Kocherlakota.

At the committee's first meeting of 2020, Rochester professor Narayana Kocherlakota expects the Federal Open Market Committee to hold the course on interest rates, as issues from trade wars to impeachment loom.

Rochester professor of economics Narayana Kocherlakota expects to be disappointed this week, as the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee has signaled that it will make no changes to an eight-year-old policy statement for meeting inflation and unemployment goals.

The Great Recession officially lasted through June 2009, with unemployment levels peaking in October of that year. And while unemployment is now the lowest it’s been in the last 50 years, Rochester experts say the recession is still very much with us.

“There’s a lot of evidence that in the last eight years or so the Fed has lost control,” says Narayana Kocherlakota, the Lionel W. McKenzie Professor of Economics at the University of Rochester.