
The thinking behind it is dangerous though.
The economy isn't overheating. There's absolutely no reason to believe that the Fed would let inflation get out of control. There's no reason at all why they can't wait.
But, the default thinking of most of the people in the FOMC seems to be that rates need to go up, because rates need to go up. It doesn't matter that wages are still historically stagnant, rates need to go up, because shut up that's why.
It's madness.
I've seen some arguments that rates need to go up so that they can be cut when the US economy goes into recession again. But since there's no sign of a recession anytime soon (the economy isn't overheating, and shocks are by definition unpredictable, and the economy is still weak, etc.), that doesn't strike me as an argument that should have control of the near-term decision making.
It's like the "We have to cut Social Security now because it'll be broke in 30 years if we don't do anything and then we'd have to cut benefits!!" argument.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.