This Bloomberg headline caught my eye:

Powell Treads Tricky Path in Saying Wages Are Rising Too Fast

He’s right. Here’s how Powell should frame the issue:

1. Rapid real wage growth is good; it leads to higher living standards for average Americans.

2. Rapid nominal wage growth (relative to productivity growth) is bad, it generally implies high inflation.

3. The best way to promote higher real wages is through economic reforms that boost productivity.

Given our rate of productivity growth, the Fed needs to get nominal wage growth down to no more than 3%.

PS. Check out this FT headline:

Jay Powell channels his inner Paul Volcker with tough stance on US inflation

Tough? Did Volcker end the Great Inflation by raising interest rates from 0% to 0.25%?

Off topic, how about this FT headline and subhead:

Why I should have listened to Garry Kasparov about Putin

The chess grandmaster was dismissed when he warned about Russia. But he was right

Over the past decade, I’ve also noticed a lot of westerners in denial about Putin. Some even seem to idolize him.

Former US president Donald Trump posited that Russian president Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine was driven by a desire to recreate the Soviet Union in which there was “a lot of love”.

So the war is Putin’s valentine to the Ukrainian people?