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In December 2008, The Federal Reserve went from a target RATE to a target RANGE to give themselves more flexibility to set monetary policy amidst economic uncertainty. They were saying the quiet part out loud. It was too hard, even in 2008, to know precisely what was going on in the economy with the tools and data The Fed had access to. In 2025, 17 years later, it is reasonable to ask two critical questions: 1. Does the free market, using SOFR, now have a better rate setting mechanism than Fed Governors via Fed Funds? SOFR is robust, calculated and secured. Fed Funds is human derived, unsecured and sits on top of data that changes wildly after the fact. It’s prime to inaccuracy, politics and partisanship, which we are seeing now. 2. Is the Fed an effective Lender of Last Resort? It’s hard to say but the track record is spotty and there is ample evidence that Treasury has done this function better in the past. All of this is to say that as the global economy has become more robust, we need to improve the underlying infrastructure it uses to function properly. There are other important things that The Fed does and likely should continue to do, like banking oversight, but the most dynamic parts of monetary policy should be the least susceptible to politics and partisanship. If the data says cut, you should cut. And vice versa if/when the time comes… The free market is more likely to strike this balance better as we move forward.