They don't really have a mechanism, and rates are set in the global market - return on capital is mostly a global issue now and something the fed has no control over.
They can target the overnight rate and buy and sell short term funds because they are the majority player there, but even then the actual Fed Funds rate doesn't always equal the target they are trying to set (and not by a few points either).
On the long end they are more constrained. They can print a ton of money to cause inflation, but going the other way just isn't as easy. They aren't the major player there either. Long term treasuries compete with every other debt instrument out there government and private. Those rates are global for the most part
Just look at the late 90s when the Fed tried to push long term rates up and failed horribly. All they did is invert the curve. It is a repeating scenario.
This same conversation comes up about once a decade it seems.
They can, they just don't have a direct tool for doing it. Long term rates are just an aggregation of short term rates over a given time span. So they can adjust long term rates via promises and hints that they will keep short term rates low for a long time.
There is a ton of interesting monetary theory about how the Fed can do this and issues they run into.
long term rates are more than short term rates added together. while related, short term rates are much more driven by central bank reserve and regulatory policy, and long term rates much more driven bvy return and inflation expectations.
In a real dollar sense, the fed has zero ways to affect long term rates.
Sure there are other factors that affect long term rates. But if the Fed came out tomorrow and said "We promise to keep interest rates at 0 for the next 10 years" long term rates would drop considerably wouldn't you agree?
Not at all. Inflation expectations would soar. A few years ago and there talk was that keeping the overnight rate would lead to huge inflation issues. Now a strange narrative is appearing that nominal interest rates are simultaneously too and inflation going higher.
And there is no way they would be to keep that rate. They can say whatever they want, but that doesn't mean the overnight rate has to oblige them either. They only set a target, the actual rate is still determined in the bank to bank market and historically it does diverge, sometimes strongly.
I'm curious, why can't they manipulate it directly? It seems like if a central bank bought enough long-term bonds, supply would drop enough to raise the price?
The opposite. If they buy every long term bond that means that companies (and the Treasury too), can put them up for any price, let's say zero coupon payment, that's a zero yield bond.
No, to drive up rates would mean to restrict the buyers from buying (either via restricting the money supply - that means a combination of raising the overnight repo rate [FFR - Federal Funds Rate], raising reserve requirements, decreasing interest payment on reserves).
But such a move means slowing down regular lending, VISA/MasterCard and the banks would have to increase consumer facing prices of credit, etc. It would slow down wage growth.
And we are not seeing wage growth, we're not seeing inflation.
To stimulate spending/consumption all the Fed can do is absorb more and more risk (buy bonds/assets - quantitative easing, keepr rates low, encourage lending, encourage the starting of new projects).
Why people are not starting new projects?
Well, for example look at NIMBYs, look at how Congress doesn't want to force mandate better EPA regulations, look at how municipal fiber plans were stopped thanks to Comcast lobbying, etc.
Basically a lot of money goes into "rent" instead of innovation. (Asset bubbles.)
