| Is the Federal Reserve going too far, too fast? It may be, with real consequences for both the labor market and the stock market. In an interview on CNBC yesterday, Chicago Federal Reserve President Charles Evans suggested that the Fed's aggressive rate increases may be a bit reckless. In response to a question about how the economy reacts to interest rate hikes with a time lag (those lags are thought to be at least nine months and sometimes twice that long), Evans said he was definitely worried. "I am a little nervous about exactly that," Evans said. "There are lags in monetary policy, and we have moved expeditiously." "Expeditiously" is an understatement if you ask me. Just look at the pace of interest rate hikes by the Fed this tightening cycle compared with those of past cycles. The Fed has raised rates six times since February, taking the federal funds rate from zero to a range of 3.0% to 3.25% in just seven months. That's a much more rapid pace than in other recent tightening cycles. And the Fed is expected to hike its target rate at least three more times by February of next year, pushing it to 4.75%. By the time all those rate hikes take effect - possibly in 2024 - inflation may have come down significantly and the unemployment rate may have soared, with hundreds of thousands of jobs lost. | 
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