Six Hundred Atlantic Federal Reserve Bank of Boston

Can employers do more to solve the child care crisis? Some policy groups say child care and employer would benefit if they did. Boston Fed senior policy analyst Sarah Savage discusses what deeper employer involvement looks like and what it could mean.

The Boston Fed has long studied New England’s opioid crisis because of its economic impacts. In this episode, Boston Fed writer Amanda Blanco and photographer Steve Osemwenkhae discuss what they learned from talking with people fighting addiction and helping others overcome it.

The condition of U.S. currency–including whether it’s genuine–is the business of the Federal Reserve because healthy currency is essential to keep the economy moving. But how does the Fed know when notes aren’t “fit for commerce?” Or when they’re fake?

The pandemic could have wiped out cash, as people increasingly turned to online and touch-free transactions. Instead, cash usage fell, then held steady. Why? In this episode, we examine cash’s future and the Fed’s role in keeping it available.

Researchers have long investigated why some races have more wealth than others, and inheritances and other forms of intergenerational wealth are often seen as major factors. But Federal Reserve Bank of Boston economist Jeff Thompson says they play a minor role.

Personal excess savings in the U.S. reached extraordinarily high levels during the pandemic, peaking between $2.0 – $2.6 trillion in 2021. That’s equal to 10% of the nation’s gross domestic product. Economists believe these savings helped keep the economy moving during post-pandemic inflation because consumers could use that money to keep spending.
But there’s wide disagreement about how much of these excess savings is left – and what happens when it’s gone. In this episode of Six Hundred Atlantic, Boston Fed economist Omar Barbiero discusses why excess savings matter, why estimates vary widely, and what surprised him when he studied how fast savings were being depleted across income groups.