James Galbraith, economist: 'The Fed is an agency created by Congress, controlled by it, and accountable to it'

A leading figure in American heterodox economics, James K. Galbraith, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, analyzes the conflict between Donald Trump and the Federal Reserve and shares his assessment of the current state of the US economy. Galbraith played a part in drafting the Fed's charter: In 1978, as a young economist for the House Banking Committee, he wrote the provision in the Humphrey-Hawkins Act that requires the Fed to testify regularly before Congress. Since then, these hearings have become routine. Author of The Predator State (2008) and Inequality: What Everyone Needs to Know (2016), he has just published, with Jing Chen, Entropy Economics. The Living Basis of Value and Production (2025).

Are the pressures exerted by the White House on the Fed to lower its interest rates completely out of line?

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