john c williams : " elementary, dear data " remarks by mr john c williams, president and chief executive officer of the federal reserve bank of new york, at the 2023 us treasury market conference, federal reserve bank of new york, new york city, 16 november 2023. * * * as prepared for delivery introduction this is the ninth year that our joint member agencies have come together for this conference. it's been a wonderful five - way partnership. but the honorific of " greatest crossover of all time " must be awarded to the theme and corresponding title of my remarks today. for those who know of my proclivity to lace my speeches with music references, no, i am not referring to the crossover of taylor swift and travis kelce. instead, i'm referringof course - to the epic 29th episode of star trek : the next generation, titled " elementary, dear data, " in which 221b baker street meets enterprise - d in a brilliant sherlock holmes - style mystery. it's a perennial fan favorite for trekkies and sherlockians alike. but the reason i mention it today is that i'd like to speak about how data - transactions - based, transparent, and well documented - is elementary to our collective understanding and decision - making at the federal reserve and beyond. before i get in any deeper, and rest assured i will, i need to give the standard fed disclaimer that the views i express today are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect those of the federal open market committee ( fomc ) or others in the federal reserve system. data dashboard sherlock holmes stressed the importance of " data, data, data. " i, too, have been often quoted emphasizing the need to be " data dependent. " 1 in sherlock's world, data means fingerprints, footprints, handwriting, and ciphers. in our world, data means economic indicators like gross domestic product, the consumer price index, and the unemployment rate. these numbers make up the dashboard of what's happening in the economy. these are numbers we can trust. government agencies in the u. s. and abroad put an enormous amount of effort into developing the methodology, implementation, and design of these official statistics. while no specific data series is without its limitations, we have an excellent understanding of how these numbers come together and behave over time. financial markets have their own data dashboards too. equity indexes, bond yields, and the value of the dollar are just a

economy and a low rise in prices for some imported goods. in addition, a larger share of demand growth, for example in the construction industry, has probably been satisfied by increased imports of services. the economic upturn is expected to continue this year. high petroleum investment, the international upturn and higher commodity prices have boosted production and earnings in the manufacturing sector. statistics norway ’ s business tendency survey points to continued favourable prospects for norwegian manufacturing. service industries and the construction sector expect that continued low interest rates and strong growth in household demand will contribute to further increasing activity in the near term. as estimated here, capacity utilisation in the norwegian economy is now close to a normal level. in manufacturing, capacity utilisation has been close to its historical average. according to norges bank ’ s regional network, about 40 per cent of enterprises will have some or considerable difficulty if production must be increased. the situation in the labour market does not indicate a build - up of substantial pressures in the norwegian economy as a whole, even though growth has been high for a fairly long period. so far, the rise in the number of employed has been fairly moderate in relation to output growth. this may be due to lagged effects of the sharp fall in sickness absence through 2004. many companies have probably not fully utilised the large increase in available person - hours. a considerable share of production growth so far this year may be the result of an improved utilisation of the existing workforce. in addition, productivity, measured in terms of value added per person - hour, increased at a fairly brisk pace in the last couple of years. in addition to high productivity growth and a reduction in sickness absence, it appears that the use of foreign labour has increased recently. the level is relatively moderate, but appears nonetheless to have reduced bottleneck tendencies in some industries where demand has increased sharply. many foreign workers who come to norway find employment in norwegian enterprises. this represents an increase in the supply of labour in norway. employment will thus be able to increase to a further extent than would otherwise have been the case without the emergence of labour shortages. in isolation, an increased supply of labour from new eu countries may lead to a higher - than - normal increase in potential output for a period. many of the foreign workers work for a shorter period in norway without being employed in a norwegian enterprise. examples are foreign contractors and self - employed in the construction industry who carry out various building projects in norway. an increase in the use of