One of the ways the Federal Reserve carries out its responsibilities for conducting monetary policy is by trying to affect the level of key interest rates. In early 2016, Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen met with President Barack Obama in the White House. According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, a spokesman for the president stated that “he ‘would not anticipate’ that Ms. Yellen would go into detail on the path of interest rates at the meeting in order to preserve ‘both the appearance of and the fact of the independence of the Federal Reserve and the chair.’”
a. What did the spokesman mean by “the appearance of and the fact of the independence of the Federal Reserve”?
b. Why might a president discussing the details of monetary policy with a Fed chair undermine the appearance that the Fed operates independently of the president? Why would the president worry about the possibility that the appearance of Fed independence might be undermined?