“Just prior to World War I emerged one of the historic disasters in American history, the creation of the Federal Reserve System.”

—ALAN GREENSPAN, 1964

“The bottom line is that we really do not know how this system works.”

—ALAN GREENSPAN ON THE FED’S OPERATION OF MONETARY POLICY, 1999

“Financial markets now view Chairman Greenspan’s infallibility more or less as the Chinese once viewed Chairman Mao’s.”

—ALAN BLINDER AND RICARDO REIS, 2005

“Ages are no more infallible than individuals; every age having held many opinions which subsequent ages have deemed not only false but absurd.”

—JOHN STUART MILL, 1859