However, the recent combination of a strong housing market and faltering stock market has put aggregate housing wealth back on par with aggregate equity wealth. Now let me turn to the influence of these movements in asset prices on the conduct of monetary policy.
When all is said and done, however, I expect that the latest numbers will turn out to have been a reflection of the typical volatility in the data and some cyclical response to the slowing in economic activity, not a signal of a sea change in the longer-run outlook for productivity growth.