Thus far I have reviewed some of those challenges, offered some diagnoses for the slow economic recovery in the United States, and briefly discussed the policy response by the Federal Reserve. However, this conference is focused on longer-run economic growth, and appropriately so, given the fundamental importance of long-term growth rates in the determination of living standards.
In that spirit, let me turn now to a brief discussion of the longer-run prospects for the U.S. economy and the role of economic policy in shaping those prospects.