Paul Volcker

From Free net encyclopedia

Image:VolckerP2.jpg The Honorable Paul Adolph Volcker (September 5, 1927 - ) born in Cape May, New Jersey, is best-known as the Chairman of the Federal Reserve under United States Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan (from August 1979 to August 1987). Volcker's Fed is widely credited with ending the United States' stagflation crisis of the 1970s by limiting the growth of the money supply, abandoning the previous policy of targeting interest rates. Inflation, which peaked at 13.5% in 1981, was successfully lowered to 3.2% by 1983 and has remained low ever since[1]. The change in policy contributed to the significant recession the US economy experienced in the early 1980s, which included the highest unemployment levels since the Great Depression. The stabilization of the price level has apparently been a success.

Educated at Princeton, Harvard and the London School of Economics, from 1969 to 1974 Mr. Volcker served as under-secretary of the Treasury for international monetary affairs. He played an important role in the decisions surrounding the US decision to suspend gold convertibility in 1971, which resulted in the collapse of the Bretton Woods system. In general he acted as a moderating influence on policy, advocating the pursuit of an international solution to monetary problems. After leaving the US Treasury, he became president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York from 1975 to 1990.

In April 2004, the United Nations assigned him to research possible corruption in the Iraqi Oil for Food program. In the report summarising the research, Volcker criticized Kojo Annan, son of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and the Swiss company Cotecna Inspection SA, Annan's employer, for trying to conceal their relationship. Volcker was a director of the United Nations Association of the United States of America from 2000-2004 prior to being appointed to the Independent Inquiry by Kofi Annan.

He is the current Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Washington-based body, the Group of Thirty. Volcker received an honorary degree from Bates College in Lewiston, Maine in 1989.

[edit]