The Federal Reserve is not keeping monetary policy easy so the government can continue running up debts and deficits, Fed Governor Christopher Waller said Monday. Defending the Fed’s independence from the fiscal authorities in Congress, Waller rejected notions that the central bank is holding borrowing costs low to help service the debt, nor is it conducting asset purchases to finance the debt-laden federal government. “My goal today is to definitively put that narrative to rest. It is simply wrong,” Waller said in prepared remarks to the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “Monetary policy has not and ... (full story)