Fed reduces bond buying to $35 Billion a month

The Fed and Janet Yellen is scaling back its bond-buying to $35 billion a month from $45 billion. And, of course, its interest-rate target stayed near zero (as it has been since December 2008).

Fed officials sharply downgraded their projections for economic growth this year.  You could see that coming after the economic contraction in the first quarter.

Gap between rich and poor

Whether a widening gap between the rich and everyone else is a problem and what, if anything, should be done about it is up for debate.

"I personally find it very worrisome," said Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen during a recent Senate hearing. Inequality can "determine the ability of different groups to participate equally in democracy, and have grave effects on social stability over time." 

Whether the widening wealth gap is a serious problem, one thing is clear: The richest have a massive amount of money, and they're getting more of it every day.


via http://money.cnn.com/2014/06/01/luxury/rich-wealth-gap/

Janet Yellen Quote May 2014

Readings on housing activity — a sector that has been recovering since 2011 — have remained disappointing so far this year and will bear watching,

Janet Yellen avoids bait

Last week, Janet Yellen spoke in front of Congress, and nothing Earth-shattering came out of it. Typically, these Fed-head testimonies are more for the benefit of the politicians and their political posturing than they are for any meaningful information. 

Basically, the left tries to get the Federal Reserve Chair to say that income inequality is bad and the right tries to get the Federal Reserve Chair to say that our spending is too high. To her credit, Yellen didn’t seem to take the bait.

http://marketrealist.com/2014/05/week-review-key-ism-services-productivity-highlights/