WASHINGTON - The Shadow Open Market Committee, a group of economists that meets twice a year to critique the policies of the Federal Reserve Board, on Monday urged the central bank to start planning for life after Chairman Alan Greenspan.
The 74-year-old Mr. Greenspan's term as chairman expires in July 2004, and the nine-member Shadow Committee implied that the popular Fed chief is expected to retire after that.
"There is no telling who will be chairman in five years," said Bennett McCallum, a professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. As a result, the Shadow Committee recommended that the Fed adopt a formal policy making inflation-fighting its foremost objective, as it has been in practice under Mr. Greenspan.
