Agreed about surprising nature of Friedman comments to NY Times at 1977 American Economics Association meeting shortly after White House announced Miller's appointment as Fed Chair. I think you are right, Rod, that Friedman partly meant that Fed Chair just has one vote. I'm just guessing that he was also partly being provocative and partly expressing his frustration that the Fed had allowed inflation to rise and not adopted Friedman's idea to fix money supply growth at some low and constant level. Fed Chair just one vote on a Committee, but I think Friedman may have leveled harsh words at outgoing Arthur Burns during Burns' time as Fed Chair. I'm returning 2 Volcker bios to library today. Bio by William Silber has long section about Friedman's criticisms of Volcker for not setting a money supply growth target.
I had no idea that Milton Friedman regarded the job of Federal Reserve Chair as not very important. If "inflation is everywhere and always a monetary phenomenon" (if I got that roughly right), he must've thought that the Fed itself was important. Was the idea just that the Chair was first among equals, and just one member of the Federal Open Market Committee who could be outvoted?
Agreed about surprising nature of Friedman comments to NY Times at 1977 American Economics Association meeting shortly after White House announced Miller's appointment as Fed Chair. I think you are right, Rod, that Friedman partly meant that Fed Chair just has one vote. I'm just guessing that he was also partly being provocative and partly expressing his frustration that the Fed had allowed inflation to rise and not adopted Friedman's idea to fix money supply growth at some low and constant level. Fed Chair just one vote on a Committee, but I think Friedman may have leveled harsh words at outgoing Arthur Burns during Burns' time as Fed Chair. I'm returning 2 Volcker bios to library today. Bio by William Silber has long section about Friedman's criticisms of Volcker for not setting a money supply growth target.
I had no idea that Milton Friedman regarded the job of Federal Reserve Chair as not very important. If "inflation is everywhere and always a monetary phenomenon" (if I got that roughly right), he must've thought that the Fed itself was important. Was the idea just that the Chair was first among equals, and just one member of the Federal Open Market Committee who could be outvoted?