Joseph Lawler of the Washington Examiner reports on prospects for major change at the Federal Reserve.
Rep. Kevin Brady hopes that significant reform of the 100-year-old Federal Reserve may be within reach.
Brady, a Republican who represents a Houston-area district, would be one of the key lawmakers in an effort to reshape the central bank in the House. He is the top House member on the Joint Economic Committee, and in that role has developed a number of possibilities for overhauling the way that the Fed controls the money supply and affects the cost of credit in the U.S.
The possibility of change coming to the Fed is as realistic now as it has been in years, with the Senate Banking Committee having passed a banking reform package that would make several changes to the operations of the central bank.
“This debate is long overdue,” Brady says in an interview in his office.
Brady has introduced one item of legislation, the Sound Dollar Act, which would limit the Fed’s discretion in setting monetary policy, crimp its ability to buy securities other than Treasury bonds, and move power away from the Board of Governors led by Chairwoman Janet Yellen in Washington.
He also plans to introduce, with fellow Texan and Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling, a bill to set up a Centennial Monetary Commission.
The commission would not prescribe any particular reforms, but would have a debate on the Fed’s role for its next 100 years. The central bank was created by the Federal Reserve Act of 1913.
The bipartisan commission would allow for a debate on the Fed, Brady said, and examine a range of policies that it could adopt. Among those are dropping the Fed’s “dual mandate” of promoting price stability and full employment to focus on just price stability, and examining the possibility of a “modified modern gold standard.” The commission also could consider having the Fed target a nominal level for the gross domestic product, a radical shift that has gained traction among top economists in recent months.