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2012 Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland Policy Summit on Housing, Human Capital, and Inequality

InterContinental Cleveland Hotel, Cleveland, Ohio

The 10th annual Cleveland Fed Policy Summit focused on effective strategies to strengthen and rebuild communities. With neighborhoods and entire regions struggling to regain their footing in the wake of a housing crisis and economic recession, now is a critical time to implement rebuilding strategies that work. What are the most effective strategies, particularly in older industrial cities and the weaker-market regions that surround them? How is the impact of programs best measured? And where should community leaders direct ever-scarcer funds to gain the greatest effect?

This year's conference featured Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President and CEO Sandra Pianalto as the opening keynote speaker. In 2012, President Pianalto again became a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee.

Award-winning journalist Alex Kotlowitz provided a closing keynote address. Kotlowitz, author of New York Times best-seller "There Are No Children Here" and the 2011 documentary "The Interrupters," shared  his insights on addressing critical challenges that face our nation's most disadvantaged people.

Attendees included elected officials, researchers, practitioners, bankers, funders, and policymakers from across the Midwest to discuss the latest research on and promising practices in economic policy and development in low- and moderate-income communities including:

  • Analyses of programs and policies focused on current conditions in labor and housing markets
  • Education policy
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Financial and human capital asset building
  • Labor and housing issues in older industrial cities
  • Long-term unemployment
  • Loss-mitigation strategies for borrowers
  • Low-income housing
  • Program implementation, evaluation, and scalability
  • Reduced local government and community development budgets
  • Workforce development

Sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland's Research and Community Development Departments

Headlines

  • How Well Does the Cleveland Fed’s Systemic Risk Indicator Predict Stress?

    Ben R. Craig

    A number of financial stress measures were developed after the financial crisis of 2007–2009 in the hope that they could provide regulators with advance warning of conditions that might warrant a corrective response. The Cleveland Fed’s systemic risk indicator is one such measure. This Commentary provides a review of the SRI’s performance from 2001 to 2020 and finds that it has performed well, providing a reliable, valid, and timely signal of elevated levels of financial system stress. Read More

  • Forward Guidance during the Pandemic: Has It Changed the Public’s Expectations?

    Wesley Janson Chengcheng Jia

    In responding to the COVID-19 crisis, the Federal Reserve has both lowered the federal funds rate and provided forward guidance. We study whether the forward guidance given with the April and June 2020 FOMC meetings altered the public’s expectations of future policy rates, GDP growth, and inflation. We find that forward guidance was effective in altering the public’s expectations about future policy rates if it was accompanied by an SEP but not expectations about economic fundamentals. We suggest that the difference might be explained by FOMC statements being interpretable in two different ways and the public not having a dominant view on which interpretation was intended. Read More

  • The CRA Is Important for Underserved Communities, and Your Input Can Help Modernize It

    Susan Schaaf

    The Fed is seeking to modernize the Community Reinvestment Act in a way that significantly expands financial inclusion, and you can have a say in how it’s done. Read More

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