Inflation, like the villain in a superhero movie, had once again reared its ugly head within the United States. Economists and analysts everywhere witnessed this with an understandable mix of trepidation and existential dread, nervously clutching their calculators and income effect motives. The Federal Reserve, being the knight in shining armor that it is, swooped in with policies akin to tourniquets: They hope to stop the monetary bleeding only to realize they are holding a rubber chicken in one hand and a saucepan in the other instead of efficient financial tools.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell, sitting astride his monetary steed, made promises to tame the inflationary beast. However, keen-eyed investors were not entirely appeased by these assurances. Over their freshly brewed cups of overpriced coffee, they began to notice an eerie pattern in the chronicles of the Federal Reserve. The contours of a monetary mystery began to emerge from the fog of the financial forecast.
Investors started to wonder, with a mix of excitement and trepidation, why they had never seen Jerome Powell and Arthur Burns, a former Fed Chair with a similar narrative, in the same room at the same time. "Could it be?!", exclaimed one over-caffeinated trader as he choked on his 90% dark chocolate bar, "another case of Fed Chair-cloning? Like the Bernanke-Greenspan conspiracy of '03?"
Armed with curiosity and a reckless disregard for sleep, these savvy investors embarked on a wild quest to uncover the truth. They traversed archives, they interrogated old financial reports, they even tried hosting a séance to make contact with the spirit of Arthur Burns, none of which is recommended by the American Association of Economists.
Rumours swirled. Powell and Burns—a same-chair theory emerged from the caffeinated depths of Wall Street. Some proposed that Jerome Powell was simply a crypto-currency powered hologram remotely controlled by the ghost of Arthur Burns. Others predicted that humans were being removed entirely from the equation and these Fed Chairs were simply robots designed by cheeky programmers to respond with "Inflation is transitory." whenever asked about the current financial situation.
They compared the speeches, the policies and the actions made by both Jerome Powell and Arthur Burns. They meticulously compared each data point, each monetary decision, each public statement. They even compared their favourite breakfast spreads—Burns, a devoted marmalade enthusiast, Powell, a peanut butter kind of a guy.
Had they discovered the ultimate conspiracy to manipulate the financial tides? Or were they merely sleep-deprived investors in desperate need of a hobby? The jury is still out.
In the FRB headquarters, Jerome Powell brewed another pot of coffee, oblivious to the world of conspiracy that Burk, the vending machine in the BASEMENT, had committed to memory. Surely, the next time any of our economists visit their trusted vending machine, they should watch out for a little extra change, a folded note or... inflation.