Indeed, 100 years ago, some of the first Fed policymakers recognized the need for more timely information on the rapidly evolving state of industry and decided to create and publish production indexes for the United States. Today I will pay tribute to the 100 years of dedicated— and often behind the scenes—work of those tracking change in the industrial landscape.
I will then turn to three challenges our dynamic economy is posing for policy at present: First, what would the consequences of a sharp rise in the price of oil be for the U.S. economy? This question, which never seems far from relevance, is again drawing our attention after recent events in the Persian Gulf.