Fed’s Aggressive Rate Hikes Raise Likelihood of a Recession

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell news conference is displayed on televisions while traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York on June 15, 2022. Seth Wenig/AP Photo

WASHINGTON—Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has pledged to do whatever it takes to curb inflation, now raging at a four-decade high and defying the Fed’s efforts so far to tame it.

Increasingly, it seems, doing so might require the one painful thing the Fed has sought to avoid: A recession.