Hello and welcome to At Barrens. I'm Andy Surwer and welcome to our guest, Muhammad Al-Aryan,

who is president of Queens College at Cambridge University and also Chief Economic Advisor

at Alianz and also a professor of Wharton, I understand.

Yes, and thanks for having me, Andy. Great to see you, Muhammad.

I want to start off by asking you a little bit

about the Federal Reserve interest rate policy. I know you've been critical of Jay Powell,

but I guess my question, Muhammad, is, is it too early to be critical? I mean, don't we have to

wait until everything sorted itself out and maybe he will

stick a perfect landing, lo and behold, in the next 12 months, and it'll all be fine.

I sure hope so. Let me just start by saying it's very unusual for me to be critical of any

central bank, let alone the Fed. I grew up in that world.

I admire them greatly, and I think they play a central role.

But I also think that when a central bank makes repeated mistakes,

it needs to be held accountable.

And it needs to be held accountable because accountability is key

for its political independence.

Politically independent central banks are absolutely crucial to the good running of an economy.

And without accountability, you don't get politically independent central banks.

So that is why I have been unusually critical because this Fed has made mistakes.

So is it too early?

No.

We know, for example, that the transitory inflation call was false.

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