Steve Forbes just put the markets on notice: unless the Federal Reserve keeps cutting rates, the long-running bull market Americans have relied on to grow their retirement accounts and small businesses could be marched straight into the slaughterhouse. His comments, carried in a Forbes piece and highlighted on his podcast, are not the musings of some armchair pundit — they come from a man who has watched markets through cycles and is blunt about what lower rates mean for investment confidence. Hardworking Americans deserve a Fed that understands the real-world consequences of choking off liquidity when businesses need it most.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has flirted with the idea of rate cuts while also signaling restraint, creating dangerous uncertainty for investors and employers alike. At Jackson Hole he opened the door to easing but stopped short of a commitment, leaving markets to guess which way the central bank will turn next and adding volatility to an already fragile outlook. That mixed message sent stocks soaring one day and left traders nervy the next, a recipe for brutal losses when the music stops.
The Fed did move to cut rates in mid-September, taking a quarter-point step that calmed markets briefly but hardly settled the matter for the long run. One modest cut was welcome, but Steve Forbes and many investors are right to say it isn’t enough if the Fed wants to avoid a deeper downturn. A stop-and-go approach risks whipsawing Main Street while big institutions make bets on the next policy move.
Forbes argues — correctly in my view — that the path to stronger stocks and a healthier economy is sensible monetary easing paired with pro-growth fiscal policy: lower taxes, fewer regulations, and a stable dollar. This is classic conservative medicine: give entrepreneurs room to breathe and let capital flow to productive use, rather than letting higher rates strangle expansion. The Fed’s job is to guard stability, not to punish savers and employers with unnecessary tightness.
Worse, Powell faces pressure from all sides, including political forces that want faster relief and factions that warn against losing the Fed’s independence — and Americans in the middle get squeezed by that tug-of-war. The mixed signals about the labor market and inflation have only amplified the uncertainty, which is why decisive, market-friendly action is needed now. Washington’s gamesmanship should not be allowed to dictate whether hardworking families see their nest eggs evaporate.
If the Fed retreats into paralysis and refuses to follow through with cuts when the data clearly points to easing, valuations built on the expectation of lower rates will come undone and the bull market can turn vicious fast. Investors can smell weakness, and capital will flee the riskiest corners of the market first — taking jobs, projects, and pensions down with it. Conservatives who care about growth must call out any central bank behavior that risks manufactured recession by mistake.
The solution is simple and unapologetically pro-American: the Fed should continue a predictable, data-driven easing path when warranted, while Congress pares back taxes and red tape so the private sector can lead the recovery. Patriots who build businesses and raise families want policies that reward risk and work, not policies that reward speculation and stoke uncertainty. If our leaders fail to act, the pain will land squarely on the backs of ordinary Americans — and they will remember who had the courage to protect their prosperity.
