The U.S. central bank's easy monetary policies should remain for an extended time to support economic growth and job creation, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Tuesday.

"The economy has made significant progress since the depth of the recession. However, we are still far from where we would like to be, and, consequently, it may be some time before monetary policy returns to more normal settings," Bernanke said in a speech during the National Economists Club Annual Dinner in Washington, D.C..

"The surest path to a more normal approach to monetary policy is to do all we can today to promote a more robust recovery," he said in the prepared speech released by the Fed.

The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the Fed's interest rate setting panel, remains committed to "maintaining highly accommodative policies for as long as they are needed," Bernanke added.

Since the onset of the financial crisis, the Fed has kept its short-term interest rate at a historically low level and rolled out three rounds of quantitative easing programs to bolster economic recovery. Endi

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)