Fed’s Barkin Says Rates Should Move to Pre-Pandemic Levels, Then Assess Next Steps

Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond President Thomas Barkin poses during a break at a Dallas Fed conference on technology in Dallas, Texas, on May 23, 2019. Ann Saphir/Reuters

WASHINGTON—The U.S. Federal Reserve needs to begin raising interest rates but it is too soon to say how far or fast that process will need to go to bring inflation under control, Richmond Federal Reserve president Thomas Barkin said Thursday.

He said it remained uncertain, given the ongoing pandemic and the tangled state of global supply chains, whether U.S. inflation would dip on its own back towards the Fed’s 2 percent target, or be driven persistently higher by rising wages, higher input costs, and businesses developing more aggressive pricing strategies.