Washington Post economics reporter: Federal Reserve counters arguments that Biden’s COVID-19 plan is too big

Washington Post economics reporter Jeff Stein said on Thursday that Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has countered arguments that President Biden’s COVID-19 relief package is too expensive. 

While appearing on Hill.TV’s “Rising,” Stein cited Powell’s remarks on Wednesday in which the chair indicated that the central bank would not scale back support for the economy without large inflation. The Fed chair indicated that having a bigger relief package was less risky than not doing enough. 

Powell’s comments came after several institutions and organizations have questioned whether the White House’s proposed $1.9 trillion package was too large and could spark massive inflation.

“You have like all of that met with this massive counterattack from the Federal Reserve – of Trump’s pick to run the central bank – with this massive statement [saying] that actually the risks of going too small are much greater than the risks of going too big,” Stein said. 

Stein noted that Powell’s statement has “huge implications for the debate over Biden’s stimulus” after these organizations repeatedly asked if the package would be too much for the economy to handle. 

“Then the Federal Reserve – one of the sort of oracles that people in D.C. use as an arbiter for these kinds of questions – saying, ‘No,’ very aggressively the other way,” he said.