I would focus as well on the Chairman’s speeches and testimony, both because he leads the Committee and because he has the best sense of the current consensus on the Committee. Projections To understand policy, it is important to understand policymakers’ views of the economy.
In the early years of the Committee, it was hard for the public to know, in any numerical way, what FOMC participants were thinking about the outlook for growth, unemployment, or inflation. Starting about 30 years ago, though, bank presidents and Board members began submitting twice-a-year economic forecasts for a year or two ahead that were published and available to the public.