If Mitt Romney is elected president, he will likely use his Federal Reserve appointments to end quantitative easing, says former White House, Treasury Department and congressional economist Bruce Bartlett.
“At a minimum, it is doubtful that the Fed will continue to maintain its present policy of being highly accommodative,” he writes in the Financial Times.
Romney has essentially pledged to replace Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke when his term ends in early 2014, and Bernanke would likely retire at the end of his term in any case.
Editor's Note: You Deserve to Know What Obama and Bernanke Are Hiding From Americans
So who might Romney choose to replace him?
“The leading academic spokesman for the Republican point of view on monetary policy is the economist John Taylor of Stanford University,” Bartlett writes.
“He is highly respected as a monetary theorist and served as undersecretary of the Treasury for international affairs during the [George W.] Bush administration.”
Taylor’s vigorous support of Romney during the election campaign has given him a leg up, he says.
But Glenn Hubbard, dean of the graduate business school at Columbia University and former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under George W. Bush, could get the nod instead, Bartlett says, as he is also Romney’s main principal economic adviser.
Not everyone is upset with Bernanke. The Chicago Tribune’s conservative editorial board, for example, while opposing the Fed’s easing on philosophical grounds, credits the Fed chairman for acting as the adult in the room while Congress and the White House are paralyzed.
“Bernanke, at least, is trying,” a Tribune editorial states.
Editor's Note: You Deserve to Know What Obama and Bernanke Are Hiding From Americans
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