Jerome Powell, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, is credited with bear markets in major U.S. stock indices for having raised the federal funds rate throughout 2018. Powell has also drawn the ire of President Donald Trump who insists that the federal funds rate—which as of March 2019 sits at a target range of 2.25 percent to 2.5 percent—is too high.
Inflation warriors of the 1970s, though, would find no grit in Powell’s resolve. The warriors banded together—in carpools and in local gardens to (intendedly) reduce gasoline and food price pressures—while proudly brandishing WIN pins (an acronym for Whip Inflation Now). They rejoiced on Oct. 6, 1979 when Paul Volcker, then Chairman of the Federal Reserve, cited the “pervasive influence” of inflation (which then stood near 13 percent) as justification for raising the discount rate to 12 percent. The rate increased to an all-time high of 19 percent in 1981.
