Back in January of 2017, when Janet Yellen was chair of the Federal Reserve, she spoke to a group of economics teachers in a national town hall meeting.

Consumers skilled in managing their finances are better prepared to weather bad times and stronger household finances overall can help sustain growth,

stabilize the economy, and mitigate an economic downturn.

As she highlighted the importance of teaching kids about money and the economy,

Yellen also highlighted the central job of the Board of Governors she chaired.

Stabilizing the economy and mitigating a downturn, of course,

also happened to be among the Federal Reserve's primary responsibilities. The Federal Reserve Board of Governors and its chair

try to stabilize the economy and mitigate a downturn by overseeing financial institutions

and setting interest rates. And they do it independent of politics.

The current Federal Reserve Chair, Jerome Powell, underscored that independence last week when he

spoke to the Economic Club of Chicago.

We're never going to be influenced by any political pressure. People can say whatever they want.

That's fine. That's not a problem. But we will do what we do

strictly without consideration of political or any other extraneous factors.

Powell didn't only underscore that independence. He demonstrated it when he said that

President Donald Trump's signature economic policy tariffs would likely hurt the economy.

The level of tariff increases announced so far is significantly larger than anticipated,

and the same is likely to be true of the economic effects, which will include higher inflation

and slower growth.

Higher inflation and slower growth.

That assessment prompted a series of attacks from President Trump.

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump threatened to fire Powell.

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