Ben Bernanke Quotes - Page 2

We’ve never had a decline in house prices on a nationwide basis. So, what I think what is more likely is that house prices will slow, maybe stabilize, might slow consumption spending a bit. I don’t think it’s going to drive the economy too far from its full employment path, though.

The risk that the economy has entered a substantial downturn appears to have diminished over the past month or so.

Monetary policy cannot do much about long-run growth, all we can try to do is to try to smooth out periods where the economy is depressed because of lack of demand

We do not expect significant spillovers from the subprime market to the rest of the economy or to the financial system.

Inflation is certainly low and stable and, measured in unemployment and labour-market slack, the economy has made a lot of progress. The pace of growth is disappointingly slow, mostly because productivity growth has been very slow, which is not really something amenable to monetary policy. It comes from changes in technology, changes in worker skills and a variety of other things, but not monetary policy, in particular.

Speaking as somebody who has been happily married for 35 years, I can't imagine any choice more consequential for a lifelong journey than the choice of a traveling companion.

With respect to their safety, derivatives, for the most part, are traded among very sophisticated financial institutions and individuals who have considerable incentive to understand them and to use them properly.

While rising delinquencies and foreclosures will continue to weigh heavily on the housing market this year, it will not cripple the U.S.

Life is amazingly unpredictable; any 22-year-old who thinks they know where they will be in 10 years, much less in 30, is simply lacking imagination.

If you are not happy with yourself, even the loftiest achievements won't bring you much satisfaction.

The financial crisis appears to be mostly behind us, and the economy seems to have stabilized and is expanding again.

The central bank needs to be able to make policy without short term political concerns.

Nobody really understands gold prices and I don't pretend to understand them either.

September and October of 2008 was the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression.

The economic repercussions of a stock market crash depend less on the severity of the crash itself than on the response of economic policymakers, particularly central bankers.

The sources of deflation are not a mystery. Deflation is in almost all cases a side effect of a collapse of aggregate demand.. a drop in spending so severe that producers must cut prices on an ongoing basis in order to find buyers.

Although low inflation is generally good, inflation that is too low can pose risks to the economy - especially when the economy is struggling.

Education - lifelong education for everyone - from toddlers to workers well advanced in their careers - is indeed an excellent investment for individuals and society as a whole.

The crisis in Europe has affected the US economy by acting as a drag on our exports, weighing on business and consumer confidence and pressuring US financial markets and institutions.

Developments in financial markets can have broad economic effects felt by many outside the markets.

Investment banks manage to go bankrupt through their investment-banking activities, commercial banks manage to go bankrupt through their commercial-banking activities.

The best approach here, if at all possible, is to use supervisory and regulatory methods to restrain undue risk-taking and to make sure the system is resilient in case an asset-price bubble bursts in the future.

Both humanity's capacity to innovate and the incentives to innovate are greater today than at any other time in history.

It's the price of success: people start to think you're omnipotent.

Not all information is beneficial.