Nixon's major economic goal was to reduce inflation; the most obvious means of doing so was to end the war. As the war continued, the administration adopted a policy of restricting the growth of the money supply to address the inflation problem. In February 1970, as a part of the effort to keep federal spending down, Nixon delayed pay raises to federal employees by six months. In 1970, Congress granted the president the power to impose wage and price controls, though the Democratic congressional leadership, knowing Nixon had opposed such controls through his career, did not expect Nixon to actually use the authority. The price controls became unpopular with the public and business people, who saw powerful labor unions as preferable to the price board bureaucracy.
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