FED Up

AITOOW thinks the Federal Reserve isn't scared of raising rates because of it's effect on the economy? Directly anyway. It knows that a rate increase will signal that the free money party is over to market professionals (smart ones anyway) and all that paper wealth will soon disappear. That REALLY will effect the economy. Not a point or two extra borrowing cost. Now this day of reckoning was always inevitable once it intervened like it did in 2008. The question is (and has been for a while) - is it better to wait too long to raise rates (like it did before the first Great Depression and probably already has) and try to avoid direct blame (like before) or try and limit the damage and maybe take a little heat? Some historians say that the Fed caused the Great Depression by taking monetary policy out of the hands of the banks and giving it to bureaucrats (its mission). Bureaucrats that made money too easily available because of political pressure or flawed economic theories. "Putting a penny in the fuse box" was the way Alan Greenspan described it. Funny how history repeats itself. I know - they are tinkering with the methodology. Like sucking in other national banks and supporting the Market by purchasing stocks. Just seems like they are adding air to the balloon. Hopefully, they are regulating the pressure like they think they are. Seems like bureaucrats always over estimate their intelligence.