Jackie Curley:

Good evening, everyone. Welcome to tonight's session on the economic outlook and monetary policy. My name is Jackie Curley and I am the associate director of our Investment Strategy and Solutions Group here at Wellington. I have the pleasure of welcoming you on behalf of Wellington Management, 100 Women in Finance, and the Insurance Women's Investment Network (IWIN). I co-chair the Boston Education Committee of 100 Women in Finance and my colleague Sarah Moschock is on the board for IWIN. For those of you less familiar with these organizations, 100 Women in Finance is focused on strengthening the financial industry by empowering women to achieve their full potential at every stage in their career. We are thrilled to have the new CEO of 100 Women in Finance, who's on day nine here, Rehana Farrell, joining us here in Boston tonight. And in addition, IWIN is a global network focused on fostering relationships and encouraging women to maximize their potential within the insurance investment industry. Wellington is proud to be one of the founding members of that organization back in 2013. This is our first joint event of 100 Women in Finance and the Insurance Women Investment Network, and we're hoping that there are many more to come in the future. Wellington Management is one of the world's largest privately owned investment management firms, with over $1 trillion in assets that we manage across all geographies and asset classes. As active managers, investment research is really at the heart of what we do and navigating the macro environment, particularly in this environment is becoming increasingly important as we look to exceed our clients’ expectations.

Tonight, we are honored to have President Collins joining us from the Boston Federal Reserve – and taking time out of her busy schedule to engage with the financial community here in Boston. Our discussion will be moderated by Juhi Dhawan, senior managing director, partner and team leader of our Global Macro Research team here at Wellington. Juhi brings her own deep experience and expertise in analyzing US and global economies from her 30 years at Wellington and we are grateful for Juhi's close collaboration in bringing this event to fruition.

Before I hand over to Juhi to formally introduce President Collins, I wanted to highlight that this event is being livestreamed, and a transcript and the recording will be posted on the 100 Women in Finance and Federal Reserve websites and YouTube channels. Now, I’d like to hand it over Juhi to kick off the conversation.

Juhi Dhawan:

Thank you so much for being here today. It's really a pleasure to have a very close-knit community of Boston come together to welcome President Susan Collins for this time.

Susan Collins is President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, which is part of the US central bank. She is a participant on the Federal Open Market Committee, which sets US monetary policy. President Collins took office in 2022 and overseas all the Boston Fed’s activities, including economic research and analysis, banking supervision and financial stability efforts, community economic development activities, and a wide range of payments, technology and finance initiatives. I also know President Collins to be a widely published international macroeconomist with an interest in policy and its impact on living standards – I think very pertinent to the discussion we will have today. She began her career on the Economics Department faculty at Harvard University and then spent many years dividing her time as a professor of economics at Georgetown University and at the Brookings Institution. Prior to joining the Boston Fed, President Collins spent 15 years at the University of Michigan. I know I speak on behalf of all my colleagues here at Wellington, but all of my colleagues and friends across the financial community, here in person and listening virtually, very warm, welcome. We are very much looking forward to this conversation. Thank you.

Susan Collins:

Let me just say how delighted I am to be here and to see all of you, thank you for joining, and I'm looking forward to a wonderful conversation. There's a lot to talk about.

Juhi Dhawan:

There is. So, President Collins, I know a little something about you, and that is you like to get to the bottom line quickly. So, we share that in common. So, we're gonna start with the big picture. You've said in previous policy-focused remarks, that your economic outlook reflects cautious optimism with some lingering uncertainties. So, given the evolving situation today, what is your current thinking about where we are in 2025 and how is that going to have an impact on monetary policy?

Susan Collins:

A good place to start and I do like to try to give a bottom line up front, especially when talking about what are quite nuanced contexts.

As you said, I am cautiously realistically optimistic for a variety of reasons, which I will explain, and maybe the best way to do that is to say a little bit about how the economy came into this new year, say a little bit about what my outlook is and why, and then briefly policy implications, and there's a lot that I could certainly say more out there, but with trying to paint that picture. So, the economy came into 2025 in a good place overall. So, what I mean by that is that economic growth was solid, had come down a bit, and we actually just this morning, got GDP data for the fourth quarter and it showed that that strength, growth of about to 2.4 percent, which is consistent with 2.8 percent for the year, it's certainly solid growth that reflected some real underlying resilience and strength and that is very much how we came into the year, and consistent with an economy growing near trend and labor market conditions that are at or near full employment and had stabilized in that context. And the data point to, I always talk about a constellation of data, so there are a lot of different indicators that point in that direction.

In my view, inflation had come down significantly from the peaks in 2022, still elevated and in my view was more slowly, but still continuing an uneven trajectory back to 2 percent inflation. There were things I was watching carefully to see whether we were really still moving sideways or coming back down. But again, I had that realistic optimism that we were well positioned and entering the year well and I would say that the outlook is much cloudier for a variety of different reasons, and that's true on both the inflation and the activity side.

So, on the inflation side, obviously there's a wide range of uncertainty, a trade policy, and I'm happy to say more about that. I'll say just a little bit. I suspect there's some interest on that side, but, you know, it looks inevitable that tariffs are going to increase inflation in the near term. My kind of modal outlook would be that could be short lived with a continuation of some you know, disinflation, but further in the future than I might have expected before, but there are risks around that, and depending on how things unfold, it may be more persistent and a larger increase.

And then on the activity side again, came in with that resilience at the same time hearing a lot about uncertainty, and I just came back from New Hampshire. I spent the day on Tuesday in New Hampshire talking to all kinds of stakeholders, and they also talked about uncertainty, causing more of a wait and see approach, and so, my outlook would have somewhat slower growth. And again, there are risks and uncertainties and those are more on the downside whereas the inflation risks are on the upside.

And so, as I pull all that together, I strongly believed at the meeting that we had last week that holding our rate steady was an appropriate policy stance, and I would, looking forward, expect that holding it steady for a longer time is likely to be appropriate. So that is that active patience, and so, to me, that's how the kind of cautious realistic, but active optimism all comes together.

Juhi Dhawan:

There's a lot to unpack there, so we're going try to do that. Let's start with the tariff piece. There's a wide range of outcomes that's possible there. Do you leverage scenario analysis, how do you try to think about the range of outcomes and what that could mean for the inflation outlook?

Susan Collins:

We do a range of different things, and maybe the place I would start is that when I am developing my modal outlook, I'm really focused on what we know, and then I do recognize, obviously, that there's a lot of uncertainty around that, and policies that could unfold, and we still don't know exactly what the trade policies will be, and that's going to matter in terms of how they factor out.

We do all kinds of data analyses. We build inference from the past, recognizing that the current context may be different in some ways from the past context, and we also gather information from talking to people in terms of what behavior might look like. So, we just recently put on our website a paper that describes a framework for analysis of how, a certain tariff increases would feed through under a set of assumptions, any model is going have to do that, to inflation, taking account of a couple of key things. One is that tariffs, of course, apply to the final goods that come across the border, but they also apply to intermediate inputs and they're significant cross-border flows and supply chain linkages and interactions. And so the framework using input-output tables takes all that into account, and it also recognizes that while from history, the import prices tend to directly reflect the impact of prices pretty immediately, but the second step has to do with what markups are going be and how much will be passed on to consumers, and so based on history has different alternative assumptions about what the markups look like and talks about what the implications with that framework would be, also recognizing that if there are other rounds and retaliation, you would have to factor that in as well.

So, we use those kinds of analyses and our goal is to be as prepared as we can with the fair sense of humility, recognizing that, you know, our models are based on history and the current context is one of coming down from high inflation, whereas recent tariffs in this country were in a period where inflation had been below target for some time, which is quite a different context. And that might have some implications in terms of how people respond.

Juhi Dhawan:

Is it important to consider the actual inflation outcomes or more focused on the inflation expectations and thinking more of the tariffs as a price level shift, if you will?

Susan Collins:

Thank you for asking that. Essentially, if you put on a tariff and it is in place permanently, I absolutely do think of that as an increase in prices. It's a price level increase. That should feed through into inflation, relatively quickly, so over the near term a couple of months and then over time, the underlying inflationary forces would then kick in. And so my baseline outlook is more in that context, which is why I had said earlier that if there are additional rounds, tariffs are more broad based, if there is different levels of retaliation, then it could be more persistent than just a relatively fast adjustment to a higher level. And that would be a different trajectory, and in particular in that kind of context, I would be looking even more closely at inflation expectations because anchoring of expectations. We have just seen how important that is for the Fed's credibility is incredibly important in terms of our ability to maintain price stability over time, to bring price inflation back down, without having as large impact on the real economy. So that's something that I take very seriously, and we have to watch the data and see how things unfold and make decisions accordingly.

Juhi Dhawan:

There are no easy answers, but I'm going ask you, President Collins, to think about the other side and share with us how you are thinking about the demand aspect. We've just talked about the supply side, but we are also witnessing change with some cities in particular being impacted by layoffs in the government sector, displaced workers, and a risk that the demand underlying demand in the US economy is softening thanks to that. So how what kind of indicators are you thinking about there and how are you going to balance this demand softness, possible demand softness, with what you're worried about on the inflation?

Susan Collins:

Let me take the policy implication piece second. There are a couple of different dimensions that are important to watch at the moment on the demand side. To your point, it is certainly true that we have seen a number of federal layoffs, those impact certain communities, certain areas, but compared to the aggregate size of the labor market, they're still quite small. If you look, for example, at new unemployment insurance claims, the federal ones have increased sharply recently, but you do not see any implications for the overall aggregate ones. I think the size is important to keep into context with the reminder that those overall aggregates mask a lot of variation in terms of particular places, sectors, and industries. But depending on what some of the other implications are related to grants and other spending that might impact decisions at private firms, that could have a bigger impact on the demand side.

And then the uncertainty that I mentioned before can cause wait and see decisions, right? So, when there's a lot of uncertainty, the option value, if you will, of waiting before making a decision that's hard to reverse, that could be investment decisions, it could be significant hiring decisions. So you tend to see more of a wait-and-see behavior, even with organizations that are quite strong, because we had been hearing about the investment plans that many companies were excited about moving forward and what could become a more pro-business environment. So, they're competing factors, a shift towards a more pro-business environment could be very, you know, friendly in that, but that may take longer to unfold. And again, we have to wait and see what happens from that standpoint.

I would also say that in the data, it's very early days. I've heard people point to, well, retail sales for February, came in low, which is true at the same time, there was, you know, weather conditions, it was really cold, and there are many possible explanations. It’s really too early to tell whether that's what we're seeing in the data. And one of the reasons why I find it so valuable to spend time talking to stakeholders around New England, which is the First District, the Boston Fed’s district, is to hear more about what people are thinking and seeing right now and as they look ahead, because of course, the statistics are telling us about last month or last quarter, and so as we try to round out that picture of what's happening with the economy, that can be helpful. So, there's certainly things to watch on the demand side.

I would maybe wrap that piece up with where I started, which is that the underlying strengths are very much still there, that we came into 2025 with, and I think it's important to remind people of that because I wouldn't want to see a kind of self-fulfilling pulling back, which can be demand slowing, which would be something to watch for as well. So, there's a lot of strength and resilience and there is certainly the possibility of adverse supply and demand considerations that are important to watch for. And so, we kind of look at all of it and in terms of policy that, again, that's a reason to be actively patient and as we see more, get more information, making decisions, so being flexible as well, in terms of how we think about policy.

Juhi Dhawan:

Thank you for that. Maybe one final thread I want to bring out of this is that this is also the year where you are conducting the Monitory Policy Framework Review. The Federal Reserve is looking and thinking about the medium-term and I'm curious to hear any thoughts you could share about how you think about a possible divergence between the data where the inflation pull is perhaps upwards, the demand pool is a little bit downwards, you have a dual mandate. Is there anything in the Framework Review that you would want to change? Because the last review had a lot to do with the asymmetry of the zero lower bound. We've now entered a world where we're seeing a lot of supply side shocks, so on and forth, is this the kind of thing you're going to be doing as you go through the review and think about, would you like to change anything in the medium-term context, or where is that focus today?

Susan Collins:

 So, let me step back and just say a sentence or two about the Framework Review itself - the Fed every five years does a review of its monetary policy strategy, its long-term goals, the tools available, its communications around that as well, because, of course, how we communicate about policy is one of the tools. This is the way that I think about it. 

You know, one way to think about the Framework Review is in 2012, the framework solidified 2 percent as the target for price stability, right? And so that has very much been an ongoing focus of the strategy related to how the Federal Reserve, the Open Market Committee thinks about implementing its dual mandate from Congress. So that's just a kind of a way to think about, ‘what is this thing?’ Having said that, Chair Powell has been quite clear that the 2 percent target is not on the table for this review. So, the 2 percent target is not one of the things that would change. We are in the middle of bringing inflation back down to 2 percent. 

I think it's really important to continue to reiterate that firm commitment to price stability and to both sides of our mandate and so from my perspective, that is a course fully important and appropriate. At the same time, there are a range of things to consider. The Review results that were announced five years ago certainly did reflect the environment that had come before. And so, a range of things are going to be discussed and on the table and that Review was announced in November and started this year. 

There's lots of interest and there are many academics and others who are sharing views and perspectives. There'll be a conference in May that the Federal Reserve Board would host and there's a series of studies and discussions underway. I'm staying very open-minded to hear the range of views and perspectives about what would be helpful as we look forward. And I don't want to get ahead of that process, but what I will also say is that one of the features of the last Framework Review process was a set of listening sessions around the community called the Fed Listens sessions. And those were really valuable in terms of getting a wide range of feedback, not just from academics and people who are actively involved in the markets, but people who participate in the economy from a variety of different contexts and perspectives around the country, and so all the Reserve Banks will be hosting Fed Listens sessions, and at the Boston Fed what we've decided to do later in May is to go out into the community, and so we will host a Fed Listens session in New Hampshire, inviting participants to tell us about local economic experiences and with a bit of a focus on labor market conditions, because of, you know, a real interest in New Hampshire in particular, which is a state with a relatively low unemployment rate, and more talent challenges, and a lot of focus on labor markets. So, this is really the listen, learn, and engage stage and the review is expected to wrap up by the fall. 

Juhi Dhawan:

We look forward to hearing what comes out of the review. You mentioned before that you were in New Hampshire earlier, talked a little bit about the importance of contacts and business community and coming up with timely insights. So, can you share a little bit about what you hear as you make your rounds and what's most important to businesses and consumers as you're out in the field?

Susan Collins:

Sure. You know, and I have to say there are many things that are really interesting about the role. One of my favorite things to do is to talk to participants who are on the ground, involved in the economy from a variety of different perspectives. And I find it really valuable for a number of reasons, right? It factors into deepening my understanding of how the economy is evolving. I already mentioned that it can give information about the current and what's more about the outlook, and also, the aggregates really mask a lot of differences by place across sectors, et cetera. 

So, when I was just in New Hampshire, we started with a tour of Velcro, which was really interesting, learning about manufacturing and innovation and supply chains. We talked to with a number of business owners who were part of the New Hampshire Tech Alliance, and a lot of interest in the dynamism related to innovation in southern New Hampshire, which has been a driver of some of the economic growth in that area and that very much led to a focus on I'd say, four different areas, some of which will be familiar to people. One is the workforce one that I have been talking about, labor supply grows more slowly in New Hampshire, it's aging more rapidly than some other areas, New England overall is a region that's aging more rapidly than the country on average. And so top talent pipelines are really important in that space, so that's one. Housing, which is probably the most frequent thing that I hear about, and people often think housing is mainly a challenge in large urban areas. It's a challenge in rural areas, it's a challenge in urban areas across the price range, so affordable housing accessibility is a problem. 

I also heard on this trip, heard about challenges to hire professionals who would love to accept, but they can't find a home for their family and so they don't actually move. And so, it's actually a labor market challenge as well. So, you know, I have visited housing initiatives to learn more about some of the collaborations that private, civic, and other groups are working on to try to address – it's going to take us all coming together. It is a problem that didn't happen overnight, and it is a significant one. Childcare. One of my previous visits in New Hampshire, I visited a childcare center, again, another barrier to employment that became more challenging during the pandemic, and we have research that is studying some of the demand challenges and also some of the supply challenges in housing. And then we also talked about aging. So those four things and uncertainty were really the themes, both in the Tech Alliance conversation and to business owners at the Chamber in Manchester. So, it was a full day. It was really interesting, and I look forward to my next visits, which will be coming up back to New Hampshire, Vermont, and a variety of other places – looking forward to as well. 

Juhi Dhawan:

You brought out so many key themes of the evolution of the US economy and what our structural factors that are driving some of the change that we see underlying, the cycle and the structure always sort of intertwined and come back and forth. So those are great insights that you've shared with us. Thank you. Let me move the conversation, perhaps to asking you to share a little bit. What happens and how do you prepare for FOMC meetings? Open the curtain a little, tell us something about how does the sausage get made?

Susan Collins:

Yeah, so, you know, I'm remembering my very first FOMC meeting, July 2022, it was literally a few weeks after I had started, and I will say it was both exciting and a bit daunting to be sitting around the table. The substantive, thoughtful discussion around the table is – I find it inspiring. I always learn a lot at those sessions and the exchange of information, there really are a range of views.

Let me just step back for a moment and just say a little bit first about how I prep for that, how do you get ready to go and then what the meeting itself is like a little bit. In some ways, I feel like I'm always doing a bit of prep. We look at all of the data, so today we got new updated GDP data. So always trying to keep our arms around how the data are evolving, what the numbers are saying, how that fits into our existing understanding of the numbers and the fact that all 12 of the Reserve Bank presidents as well as the seven governors are all, you know, we talk to each other certainly, but we all have our own teams and we're all doing that independently. I have a wonderful Research team at the Boston Fed that works to help with analyses and preparing and we talk about different perspectives of the data. So, we're always working on that and they are doing research papers on different pieces of the analysis on inflation dynamics, and on determinants of investment, and a variety of different kinds of things. And then the trips like the New Hampshire one help to round that out.

So, as we get closer to the actual meeting, about two weeks in, we start to get a kind of more intense prep process and so we have structured that. I focus on pulling all the data together on some of the key special things that we think are particularly relevant for that time period. We have a number of our experts who are, you know, around the table at the Boston Fed, and so we do a lot of quite intensive prep as I develop my own decisions about what I'm seeing, how I see the outlook and what I think of appropriate policy as I'm preparing what I want to be able to share around the table. And when we go to the actual meeting, the actual room and the Eccles [building], which is under construction, so we're in the renovated Martin [building] and it's actually almost a rounded square, the big table that we sit around. I kind of like that because to me, it fosters a bit more conversation than, you know, the very long table.

Juhi Dhawan:

It’s a very long table.

Susan Collins:

Yes. It's a beautiful, it's a very long table.

And the first day of the meeting, it is typically a full day and then a following morning. There are staff presentations and discussion about financial markets and the real economy and, so we have all of those discussions. We have a series of what we call go-arounds. So, all 19 of us share our views first, we do an economy go-round, and they are varied and quite substantive, very respectful. I mean, the flavor of that is a bit academic, but it's very engaged. I and many of my colleagues do bring information about our district to share some of those nuances, some of that qualitative information and I see that as being valuable and well-received because there are differences across. The policy is national, but the more that we can understand what’s evolving and how it's being experienced – I think that that's valuable and helpful.

The second day we have a policy go-round, so again, all 19 and then there's a final vote on the policy and after that all wraps up, the statement becomes public and the Chair has a press conference and that's related to the move towards much more transparency that happened over time. But anyway, that is the cadence and to some degree, it's ongoing, but at the same time, eight times a year, there is a much more focused intensive. Appropriately so, because I very much recognize how important the decisions that we make are for people, not only throughout our country, but throughout the world. So, that's the part that can be a bit daunting to recognize that we are making decisions under uncertainty to the best of our abilities. A little humility there is helpful, and I think it's really important to have different perspectives around the table that we really take very seriously as part of that decision process. So, thanks for asking about that.

Juhi Dhawan:

You know, that was really enlightening. I'm sure for many for participants in the room who read the minutes as I do, and I know many, many of us do, it was like great color to say, oh yes, several participants talked about this, and some talked about that. And as you were, you know, putting those pieces together, I think it just makes it clearer for us to see how you collectively reach a decision. So that was really helpful. Thank you for that.

I want to switch the discussion and switch gears and talk a little bit about you and your motivation and professional development and amazing goals that you've accomplished in your career. So just as a reminder, you've been at the Boston Fed now about three years before that you were Provost at the University of Michigan, before that a dean and a professor. What has made you want to move from academia to policymaking? They're kind of parallel, but they're pretty distinctive worlds.

Susan Collins:

So, maybe it is helpful to step back for a moment because, from my perspective, it was a smaller step than I think it may seem.

It is absolutely true that I spent most of my career in academia, as an international macro-economist, much more in the macro side, a little bit of trade earlier on. I very much enjoyed both teaching, but especially research and better understanding determinants of economic growth. I was very involved in understanding exchange rates and in many countries, exchange rate policy really is central bank policy, which is how I got much more engaged in central banking and understanding about central banks. But over time, I became more and more interested in policy and ways to use economics and almost all of my work was very empirical – sometimes case studies, sometimes econometric. I tend to think if you use different techniques and you get a similar answer, then I really believe what I’m seeing. When I was in Washington, part of splitting my time as a senior fellow at Brookings and a professor at Georgetown was to be able to continue teaching and doing research on the projects I was interested in. But having a much more applied environment and also a bit more kind of real world and a bit more interdisciplinary and a bit more kind of connected to people's everyday lives. And after a couple of decades of that I was realized that I was also more and more interested in the role that institutions play in impacting both our economy and our society, but also in helping the people who work for them to thrive, and I was getting more involved in that.

And so, I got excited about the opportunity to be a dean of the School of Public Policy. I was at the University of Michigan for 10 wonderful years, really fabulous, you know, the Ford School is a great place, and interdisciplinary, much more policy-oriented, a nice mix of a bit of research and teaching institution building for a mission-driven organization. To me, that was actually a very nice balance and when I went back to the faculty was deciding kind of what the next steps would be and was tapped to become provost, which lasted longer because of the pandemic, and again, really enjoyed the opportunity to help a mission-driven organization, but was not really involved in using my economic analysis, it was much less policy-oriented.

And so, I was really looking for an opportunity to come back to more of the balance and got very excited about the opportunity for the Boston Fed presidency, which I see is really a privilege as well as a responsibility, I talked about that and an opportunity. And to me, leading a mission-driven organization is something that I take a lot of value in working with great people, the expertise, the talent, the variety of types of things that we do at the Boston Fed is interesting to me. I see some of the talks that I give as a little bit like teachings, it’s not quite the same, but, you know, much more involvement in research and direct connection with policy. So, to me, it's actually coming back more to the balance of things that over time became most important to me. And I really feel that I get to do an important job and I get to work with wonderful people and will keep doing that to the best of my ability.

Juhi Dhawan:

Well, thank you for your service and thank you for sharing how you have managed to bring your passions together and find continue to evolve and find the roles that have really made you thrive over time. It's very inspiring. You've always called yourself a lifelong learner. What makes you want to keep learning and what is the inspiration behind that?

Susan Collins:

You know, I have to say, why wouldn't I want to keep learning, right? Part of the ‘I get to do this’ is that I am surrounded by such smart, talented, hardworking, creative people. And I learn new things every day, and so to me, that's one of the joys of life really, right? Certainly, professional opportunities to do that are important. So, I think it's partly a mindset. You know, I tend to look at what can I get interested in, how can I be intellectually curious here? Because I know there's a lot that I don't know. So, that that's more to me of a kind of a mindset, which I used to enjoy when I was teaching, talking to students about what got them excited about things and to focus on who they were and what was really interesting to them. And isn't it great that we're all different, so we get excited about different things? And seeing the different types of curiosities and questions that different people would bring to the table. I think that's how we learn more. I think that's also, in terms of understanding the economy with all of its nuances and complexities, the fact that we ask somewhat different questions that we analyze the data a bit differently, to me, that is a real plus, even if it adds complexity and it means there aren't simple answers.

Juhi Dhawan:

I'm going to ask you one final question before we open it up for Q&A, and this is to do with networks. We have a couple of networks who have been involved in this particular forum. I know I'm involved in many networks myself. I'm curious to hear how you value professional, personal networks, what have they meant to you, what advice would you give someone younger in their career, sort of thinking about should I join a network, how committed should I be, how connected should I be? Share some wisdom there, please.

Susan Collins:

To me, networks are very important, relationships are important, but we also need to recognize that all of us are different, as I said before. And for some, a really powerful, empowering network might be a very small one. And for others, it may be a whole network of networks, almost. So, I don't think it's a one size fits all, but I do think that recognizing that none of us gets to, you know, moves forward through life on our own, we always benefit from support, from help, from learning from each other.

And so, I do think networks are important, and I think finding the ways that really fit, so I encourage people to see what are the genuine ones that really resonate with who you are. So, there may be networks or sets of relationships that are helpful in terms of your professional goals, what you're trying to accomplish. There may be some that are really important just for you individually, in order to really navigate challenging circumstances and be able to have the balance that you're looking for. And that might have to do with your own career decisions, but it may actually have to do with work-life balance, or it may have to do with your own hobbies and interests, right? So, we're each a little different, I think, in terms of what that looks like and the extent to which our families provide those networks for us, or our friends, as opposed to some that you might seek out intentionally.

So, I encourage people to explore and see what things are helpful and to remember that networks go both ways. You get much more out when you put in and I think often people earlier in their careers underestimate the extent to which they can be helpful to others and how much they will learn from thinking about things that way. First of all, they'll get more out of their networks and relationships, but they also get the value and satisfaction of being helpful to others. So, to me, it should be two ways and it's not a one size fits all, so those are the pieces of advice. I guess the final thing that I would say is, you know, look for networks that are supportive and relationships that are supportive of you, but willing to give you constructive, sometimes critical feedback, right? I've learned the most from folks who were willing to really suggest that maybe I rethink something, right? I've appreciated that. So, you know, I encourage people to find those who have their interests at heart and be open and willing to really, you know, consider feedback and to be open to change in unexpected opportunities, too.

Juhi Dhawan:

Thank you. There are so many pearls of wisdom in there. I want to turn this over to Rehana, because we got a number of questions, virtually and in people attending in person. And we want to make sure we get a few of those at least in in the time that we have.

Rehana Farrell:

Thank you so much. This has been absolutely fascinating. My inner econ major, definitely geeking out and felt like this was a teaching session and it definitely peaked my intellectual curiosity. So, thank you both so much for doing this. We have over a 1,000 people joining us around the globe and one of them has submitted this question which I think is a two-part question part of which you answered, which is about the impact of consumer spending, given the current uncertainty in the policy environment. And I think I heard you say that retail sales were slower in February, but it was also cold and we have a lot of latency pro-business, you know, sort of offsetting each other, so a little too soon to tell. The other piece I think is really interesting that you didn't touch on, which is, are you seeing any impact on the global consumption of US goods given the Trump administration's foreign policy stance? And this came in from George Hogett, CEO of Chesham Investments.

Juhi Dhawan:

He also a member of the Boston Economic Club.

Susan Collins:

Yeah, so if thank you for the question. I would say that it's early to be looking at the data, right? I mean, I think, that that is one of the things to be looking for, so if you look at the data from 2020 or the fourth quarter, we did see a jump up in imports and that moderated a bit in the revision that we got this morning. But again, it was relatively small, and I think it's early days, right? So, you might have expected that in advance of anticipated tariffs that imports would go up, but then perhaps decline and that could balance out over time. So, it's a little too early to tell what that dynamic will look like, and it could be different from different countries. So, I think there have been a number of things that I've said, that's something I'm watching. We're watching a lot of different things, and it's a really good question, but I just think it's a little early to be able to really assess signal in the data on that one yet. We'll have to wait a little bit longer. And I haven't, that is not a question that we've been surveying and getting information about, but we'll be getting more of that kind of information as well going forward.

Rehana Farrell:

The amount of data that you must have in your mind is just absolutely awesome. The other questions on the other end of the spectrum this came in from Lorena Cabezas, the head of Institutional at 91, who asked, who has helped you on your career journey and what has been the best support you received, even if you may not have known it?

Susan Collins:

Oh, I love that question. There are a lot of people who have been really wonderful, supporters mentors to me along the way. I always have to mention my parents who were just such support. I had a very supportive family, which I know not everybody does, and it's really something to value, and so both my parents in different ways, throughout their lives, were extremely strong supporters and I wouldn't downplay that, having people who really expect that you can accomplish what you like and that you can choose a balance, even if it's a little different from what others might choose.

I would say I would also have to call out my advisors as an undergraduate, my undergraduate thesis advisor at Harvard, Richard Freeman, who was just a wonderful, unexpected mentor, who reached out to me. I benefited so much from him and my dissertation advisor, Rudi Dornbusch, international economist, and there I would have to say, he could, and if he were still here, he would enjoy me saying this, he could practice a bit of tough love, and I learned a huge amount from him, which I really appreciated a lot more over time. It could be daunting, but the idea that you can do things in your own way, and so, being comfortable saying, you do that that way, which is great, but I'm going do that this way. And being able to really work through some of that in graduate school, with again, somebody who was really being very supportive. And so, I would single them out, that's early in my career.

I had many people throughout my career and thank you to many people. I think it's important to say, relationships matter and so, appreciate the question and hope that, we keep talking about the people who work together and who support and help us.

Rehana Farrell:

That ties really nicely into networks and just the value.

Susan Collins:

Absolutely.

Rehana Farrell:

Do we have time for audience Q&A or should I turn this over? Thank you again. And thanks to Wellington for hosting us this.

Audience member:

Hi, thank you so much for some wonderful discussion. My question relates to sort of hard data versus soft data, things that are a bit more forward looking but at the same time are more survey based. And in your opinion, how should we be interpreting some of the soft data that is coming out a little bit more, softer? No pun intended, in either in, you know, sort of consumer confidence which might have implication on consumer spending, or in relation to the job markets or hiring plans, things like that, which are kind of looking soft. What do you think?

Susan Collins:

Yeah, so my view is in general, I tried very hard not to overreact to any one or two, just a few pieces of data, whether it's survey data or statistical data. One piece is, some of the data that come out, not just recently, but this is always true, things that really pique your interest, tend to stand out and be different. And I often want, okay, what's corroborating? What are what is the broader constellation saying? So, you don't want to get behind the curve at the same time, you don't want to overreact to just a little bit of new data. Some of the data get revised, sometimes there really is a mix of data. And that can mean different things.

In terms of the sentiment, again, something that I am absolutely watching because there's certainly are very plausible scenarios in which that, downturn in sentiment is a signal to us that there will be more pulling back and slower demand and that that could impact activity. Having said that, the historical analyses do show that the part of consumer sentiment that's not related to underlying fundamentals. It's not a very good predictor of future consumption and future real behavior. And so that would suggest that the fundamentals underneath are still quite robust, and so that would suggest there's not that much additional information. It's more just, there's more noise and less signal there. But I think we have to wait and see, because I think you could also make arguments that, and consistent with some of the things I'm hearing, that there is more of a wait and see sentiment, and so that that sentiment may not be as well captured by what some of the history might tell us. So, I think we just don't know yet and we'll have to see.

I think that the more information, you know, I almost think of a jigsaw puzzle, right? We have some of the pieces, and we're trying to figure out what is the picture look like? What additional pieces of information can we get to help us make sense of what the picture is actually telling us.

Audience member:

First of all, thank you for the wonderful comments. I'm raising two teenage daughters and tonight at dinner, we'll be talking about you. So, thank you for this. I wanted to ask, I'm curious, how much do you all discuss as a body these big trends that are happening to our economy in terms of aging, demographic trends, you talk a little bit about housing and how that is impacting economy and the choices that people make. But I'm curious, how do you balance those long-term shifts and structural changes with your short-term needs to manage?

Susan Collins:

Thank you. Thank you for that question and let me try to be succinct because of time because it's a lot one could say related to that. So maybe let me say two things.

One is, I really appreciate a question about the longer term. I think it's very important for us to think about that. I certainly, in addition to the shorter term, am quite interested in longer term trajectories. The Boston Fed's overarching mission is a vibrant economy that works for everybody and that's about long-term vibrancy. The way that I think about the dual mandate with price stability and maximum employment, it's price stability over time, that is what enables or creates an environment in which the benefits of maximum employment in a vibrant economy can be shared out more broadly. To me, the short-term decisions that we're making very much have a longer-term view in them. And so having that sense is important. If you look at our SEP, the Summary of Economic Projections, that we make public quarterly in the most recent one, just came out, last week. There is an estimate of the members of the Committee’s long term real economic growth. I think it's about 1.7 percent for long term. It's about where I would be. So just very quickly, there are a lot of things that factor into long term economic growth. It's actually something that earlier in my career, I did quite a bit of work on trying to understand determinants of growth because that's so central to people's living standards. And so, demographics, aging, you know, as we age, the implications of that do tend to slow growth because of their impact on labor supply. But there are other things that we're seeing, which actually work in the other direction. So, recently, we saw increases in prime-age labor force participation. We saw increases in immigration. So those both pushed up labor supply. We'll have to see what continues going forward. We also saw quite strong productivity growth and that's another place where I'm realistically optimistic. Some of that productivity growth reflected firms changing their ways of doing business because it was so hard to hire back in 2022, 2023. And seeing that there were more opportunities for them, I think it's a little early for us to be seeing benefits of AI, but it's possible going forward that we will see some more adoption of technology in different places. And so, it's possible that we will see longer term increase in productivity, which would then tend to increase underlying trend growth. So, a number of different factors are things that we study, we certainly talk about them.

And that brings me maybe the last thing that I'll just say, the Fed’s portfolio is actually pretty broad. I've talked a lot about monetary policy, but we also, as mentioned at the beginning, we supervise banks and focus on financial stability. We are engaged in an effective, secure payments and financial infrastructure. And we also have a community economic development function, which focuses on collaborative work to try to support vibrancy in lower- and moderate-income communities, including rural areas, smaller cities, and so there's actually much more in that broader portfolio that's part of the work that the Fed does to foster a vibrant economy. Appreciate the question that lets me add a little bit of that breadth to some of the work that we do. Thank you.

Terry Burgess:

I’m Terry Burgess, some one of the firm's three managing partners here at Wellington. I just want to extend my thank you to President Collins. So much of what we try to inspire here at Wellington, I know all of you in the financial community do, were on display today, one of which would be lifelong learning, this real blend of, you know, analytical approach and hands on approach. I really loved hearing all anecdotes that you shared. Sense of humility, and the real authentic care you take in your role in knowing the real human implications that are on the other side of every decisions. So, there there's just so much in there that we learned a lot, in terms of the Boston Fed, the long, but intimate table, and Fed policy, but I think we learned as much about how to conduct yourself and how to go about this journey of lifelong learning. Thank you to Juhi Dhawan, our own of our own expert moderator and also lifelong learner, the investors here Wellington really lean on you, and I know others in the financial community do as well because you do blend that same networking, lifelong learning, and that blend of analytical, hands-on experience. In terms of lessons learned, one for me is that we should have charged for this one. We never sell out? I don't know that we've ever had a 1,000 people, so you know, that's one for next time. Want to thank IWIN, the Insurance Women's Investment Network, and 100 Women in Finance, for the next one when we charge, we will give you both a cut. For our internal group at Wellington for all the support, and making this happen, making this such an impactful and powerful event, uh, that would be Priyal Goyal, Marie Joseph, Yana Chang, Sarah Maruk, Juhi, and Jackie Curley. And our panel just wanted to let you know that I know this could have gone on for another hour, but our panelists will be graciously around for any questions that you might have, and we welcome you to stay and join in that conversation. So, thank you.