The Fed welcomes a ‘soft landing’ even if many Americans don’t feel like cheering

WASHINGTON (AP) — When Jerome Powell delivered a high-profile speech last month, the Federal Reserve chair came the closest he ever had to declaring that the inflation surge that gripped the nation for three painful years was now essentially defeated. And not only that. The Fed’s high interest rates, Powell said, had managed to achieve that goal without causing a recession and high unemployment. Yet most Americans are not in the same celebratory mood about the plummeting of inflation in the face of the high borrowing rates the Fed engineered. A majority of Americans still complain about elevated prices, given that the costs of such necessities as food, gas and housing remain far above where they were before the pandemic erupted in 2020.