Remote work boosts disabled

An embrace of remote work spurred by the pandemic helped the employment rate for disabled people reach an all-time high last year.

The percentage of disabled people who were employed rose to 21.3% in 2022, according to data released Thursday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That’s more than a two percentage point increase from 2021 and the most since 2008, when comparable data was first published.

The unemployment rate for disabled people dropped last year along with the national average.

Fed increases may be needed

Federal Reserve officials may need to raise interest rates as high as 6.5% to defeat inflation, according to new research that was sharply critical of the central bank’s initially slow response to rising prices.

In a paper presented Friday at a conference in New York, a quintet of Wall Street economists and academics argue that policymakers still have an overly optimistic outlook and they will need to inflict some economic pain to get prices under control.

The 55-page academic study included a series of simulations to predict likely paths for the Fed’s benchmark policy rates.

The computer models suggested rates would peak at either 5.6%, 6% or 6.5% in the second half of 2023.

From wire reports

The Fed has already raised rates from near zero a year ago to a target range of 4.5% to 4.75%, with officials in December projecting it will reach 5.1% this year, according to their median forecast.