Return to Virginia Business - January 2004

Around the Old Dominion

Broaddus bowing out

Virginia Business
January 2004

One of the Federal Reserve’s staunchest inflation hawks is stepping down. Richmond native J. Alfred Broaddus Jr. says he’ll retire in August after serving more than a decade as president of the Federal Reserve Bank in Richmond.

Broaddus, who turns 65 in July, began his career at the Richmond Fed in 1970, when he was hired as a research economist. He became senior vice president and director of research in 1985 and was named president of the Richmond Fed in 1993.

Broaddus helped shape the monetary policy that helped stem the high inflation of the late 1970s and early 1980s. With today’s inflation rate low — about 1.5 percent — and the economy growing, Broaddus has only a mild concern: At a recent speech at Longwood College Broaddus said that rising productivity could outpace demand and drive inflation even lower.

Still, Broaddus declared himself “confident that the Fed can sustain the environment of price stability we fought so long and hard to achieve.”

The Richmond Fed’s board of directors is looking for a successor.

Virginia Business - January 2004