Recollections of a Bleeding Heart

There were not many people in Paul's office at the time. The weight was very much on their shoulders and on introspective how to deal with that piece of news. We knew there was a significant risk that the economy would go into recession. On top of the fiscal tightening, which was being done for structural reasons, not for macroeconomic reasons. That wasn't the principal purpose of it, except in a structural sense. But the monetary policy response was just huge.