The Fed’s Forecast
April 15, 2021
After its meeting yesterday, the Federal Reserve said it will be years before it raises interest rates again. The Fed now doesn’t expect to lift its benchmark interest rate until 2023. Its Fed funds rate has been in a range of 0-0.25 percent since mid-March, when the economy went into lockdown.
Along with the rate decision, the Fed also projected Wednesday that the American economy will shrink 6.5 percent in 2020. We’ve already seen GDP decrease by 4.8 percent in the first quarter of this year.
However, the Fed does not expect the recession to be long-lived. The central bank thinks that 2021 is expected to show a 5 percent gain, followed by 3.5 percent in 2022.