*  *  *  It is an honor to be here today with such distinguished panelists to discuss the communications challenges associated with quantitative easing. I should say at the outset that the views I express here today are my own and may not reflect those of other Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) members.
I'll start with the FOMC's commitment, when the current asset purchase program was launched in September 2012, to continue purchases until the Committee sees a substantial improvement in the outlook for the labor market, a term the Committee left undefined. 1 This commitment was powerful precisely because it was open ended. But “open ended” does not mean unending.