# Federal Reserve’s Goolsbee calls for improved economic projections and central bank independence > Source: > Published: 2026-09-21 13:09:24+00:00 # Federal Reserve’s Goolsbee calls for improved economic projections and central bank independence Chicago Fed president warns that supply shocks, AI-driven demand, and political pressure threaten the central bank's ability to hit its 2% inflation target Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee wants the Federal Reserve to sharpen its forecasting tools and, while he’s at it, would like everyone to remember who the Fed actually works for. Spoiler: it’s not the president, and it’s not the markets. Speaking at an Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum event in London on September 21, Goolsbee laid out a case for overhauling the Summary of Economic Projections, the Fed’s quarterly exercise where policymakers publish their individual forecasts for growth, unemployment, inflation, and interest rates. The SEP, often called the “dot plot” for its visualization of rate expectations, has long drawn criticism for being more confusing than clarifying. ## The SEP problem Each FOMC participant submits their own projections independently, with no requirement that the assumptions underlying those forecasts be consistent. One governor might be pricing in aggressive tariff escalation while another assumes trade tensions cool off. The result is a scatterplot of dots that markets obsess over but that may not actually represent any coherent policy path. ## Supply shocks as the new normal The core of Goolsbee’s argument is that large supply shocks have stopped being exceptional and started being regular. That distinction matters enormously for how the Fed sets policy. US inflation stood at 3.7% as of July 2026, nearly double the Fed’s 2% target. The Fed raised its policy rate by 25 basis points in mid-September, a move that signals continued concern about price pressures even as the economy shows signs of strain in certain sectors. ### The news moving money, markets, and the world—before your day starts. Daily. Free. Join 34,000+ readers across crypto, finance, and policy. Goolsbee specifically flagged two sources of concern: elevated inflation in the service sector, which tends to be stickier and harder to bring down than goods inflation, and the potential for massive AI-related capital expenditures to overheat aggregate demand. Companies are pouring billions into data centers, chips, and infrastructure to support artificial intelligence workloads, and while that investment may boost long-term productivity, in the near term it adds fuel to an already warm economy. ## Independence is not optional Perhaps the sharpest edge in Goolsbee’s remarks was his insistence that the Fed’s job is to respond to economic conditions, not to markets or the president. That framing is deliberate and pointed. The logic is straightforward. If markets or politicians believe they can influence the Fed’s rate decisions, inflation expectations become unanchored. Businesses and consumers start behaving as though higher inflation is permanent, which in turn makes it permanent. The Fed’s most powerful tool isn’t the rate itself but the belief that it will do whatever is necessary to bring inflation back to target. With inflation running at 3.7%, that belief is already under pressure. Any perception that the Fed is trimming its sails to accommodate political headwinds would compound the problem. **Disclosure:** This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our [Editorial Policy](https://cryptobriefing.com/editorial-policy/).