Darrell Castle talks about the new Federal Reserve Chairman recently appointed by President Trump. Transcript / Notes MEET THE FED’S NEW BOSS Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report.  Today is Friday, November 10, 2017, and as you may know November 10 is the Marine Corps birthday.  I couldn’t let that day go by without at least saying “Happy Birthday” to my fellow Marines.  I should also mention the tragic shooting at a church in Texas as the important story for the week but, despite the tragedy,  today we discuss something more mundane but something of great importance, and that is President Trump’s appointment of the new Federal Reserve Chairman. Assuming confirmation by the Senate, and that seems like a mere formality, the new Fed Chairman will be Jerome “Jay” Powell.  Mr. Powell is a graduate of Princeton University and Georgetown University Law School so he is a lawyer not an economist.  He is a former investment banker with a little Treasury Department time under George H. W. Bush.  He was also a partner in the Carlyle Group, which is basically a Bush Family hangout for financial wheelers and dealers, but he was appointed to the Federal Reserve Board in 2012 by Barack Obama.  Since Mr. Powell’s appointment he has never cast a single vote against Janet Yellen or the Federal Reserve Board’s decisions; not one no vote in six years. His series of votes supporting board decisions is very relevant because it makes him safe.  Mr. Powell will not rock the boat, or so it appears.  President Trump interviewed several people before he settled on Jay Powell but reportedly Steve Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury, pushed hard for Powell.  One must assume that things will remain the same because if Mr. Powell has his own opinions about monetary policy, how would anyone know what they are since he has never dissented from standard policy? Those who have known me for a while, and have listened to my pod cast on why the Fed should be abolished, know how I feel about it, but until someone like me is elected we are apparently stuck with it so we should try to understand it. The Federal Reserve (Fed) is basically a cartel of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks and the Chairman or director of each of those banks makes up the Federal Reserve Board.  The Fed board is appointed by the President, as is the chairman of the board.  The opportunity to appoint directors is not as intensely examined as the opportunity to appoint Supreme Court Justices, but the board is vitally important since it determines monetary policy, i.e., interest rates, etc., for the United States. The Federal Reserve has existed since 1914, having been formed in late December 1913, but over the last four decades it has gained tremendously in power and independence in policy making.  It’s during that forty-year period, thanks in part to four strong chairmen, that the Fed has been able to operate with little or no oversight from Congress or the President.  The only control seems to be the President’s appointment of the Board, although from a list he is given, and appointment of the chairman, also from a list he is given. Those four Chairs were: Paul Volcker, who was brought in to raise interest rates and slow inflation during the Carter Presidency; Alan Greenspan, who served for almost 20 years and whose role was to keep the system running smoothly and it worked until the crises of 2007-8;  Ben Bernanke, who came in to clean up the housing mess and instituted a policy of money printing known as “quantitative easing“, which still exists to some extent; and Janet Yellen.  Under Bernanke and Yellen ,the Fed expanded its mandate to ensure full employment and protect the dollar to a role of financial stability. During the campaign, Trump seemed to be on a collision course with the Fed since he criticized Fed policy relentlessly.  He even accused the Fed of keeping interest rates low in the campaign to help Clinton.  Many people, myself included,