I would like to thank Michael Ash for his kind introduction and the University of Massachusetts for the honor of being invited to deliver this year's Philip Gamble Memorial Lecture. In my remarks today, I will discuss inflation and its role in the Federal Reserve's conduct of monetary policy. I will begin by reviewing the history of inflation in the United States since the 1960s, highlighting two key points: that inflation is now much more stable than it used to be, and that it is currently running at a very low level. I will then consider the costs associated with inflation, and why these costs suggest that the ... (full story)