Questions prompted by a tight labor market The lack of useful historical precedent leaves us with some uncertainty about the answers to several important and challenging questions. First, estimates of the natural rate of unemployment by Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) participants and others have drifted lower as unemployment has declined without much apparent reaction from inflation. How reliable are these estimates?
9 For a discussion of floor systems and other frameworks for implementing monetary policy, see the November  FOMC minutes, available at Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (2016), “Minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee, November 1-2, 2016,” press release, November 23.