This kind of inconsistency is much less likely to occur once the FOMC has formulated an explicit public contingency plan. Second, I’ve heard from businesses that policy uncertainty is curbing their incentive to hire or invest. Similarly, I’ve heard from consumers that policy uncertainty is curbing their incentive to spend.
A public FOMC contingency plan can help reduce the level of policy uncertainty being created by the Fed. No contingency plan can ever be definitive. Inevitably, the FOMC will learn things that it did not expect to learn, and events will occur that it did not expect to occur.