Fed’s Kaplan says he sees wage pressures ahead

FAN Editor
Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Robert Kaplan speaks at Tsinghua University in Beijing
Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Robert Kaplan speaks at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China April 10, 2018.REUTERS/Elias Glenn

May 4, 2018

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Dallas Federal Reserve President Robert Kaplan said on Friday that wage pressures are set to rise and that the U.S. central bank should continue to gradually raise interest rates.

“My guess is if we look over three to six months, we’ll see some wage pressure,” Kaplan said in an interview with broadcaster CNBC. “I think this may be just a one-month aberration. Everything I see tells me there’s more wage pressure out there.”

U.S. job growth was less than expected in April and the unemployment rate dropped to near a 17-1/2-year low of 3.9 percent as some out-of-work Americans left the labor force, the Labor Department reported on Friday. But the same report also showed that wages barely rose last month

The report highlighted that there is less slack in the labor force, said Kaplan, who does not have a vote on the Fed’s rate-setting committee this year. “For me I think the Fed should continue to gradually remove accommodation,” he added.

(Reporting by Lindsay Dunsmuir; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

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