(Reuters) – While measures of U.S. inflation have surged and businesses are having a hard time finding workers, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond President Thomas Barkin predicted on Thursday that neither condition will last.
True full employment is still “somewhere down the road,” Barkin told the Richmond Risk Management Association in a virtual event, with Americans likely to flood back to the workforce in the fall.
Inflation, he said, will likely recede in the fourth quarter. “I do believe where we are right now is in a temporary thing,” he said. “As we get to the other side of this, as we get into ’22, ’23, ’24, we are just going to have to look and see, where has inflation, and importantly, inflation expectations, where have they settled.”
(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Chris Reese)
