Cochran on the Fed's Inattention to Policy Matters

Fed researchers primarily regard the Fed as a home to write publications that will advance an academic career, with "policy work" culturally degraded. Both Board and regional Feds have developed into quite good centers for academic economic research, which seems overall a good thing, but one wonders just why the central bank should funnel what is in the end taxpayer money to this endeavor. However it also means that when inflation surges to 8%, nobody saw it coming, and we wonder why.