Central Banks To Investors: “I Know Nothing!”

“I know nothing! I see nothing! I hear nothing!”

So light was Hogan’s Heroes, one could easily forget the sitcom, which debuted September 17, 1965, was set in a Nazi P.O.W. camp. More than any one character, Sergeant Schultz deserves credit for the show’s laughable levity. His gregarious girth, sincere sympathy and wonderful weakness for tempting treats — let’s just say Shultz had anything but steely resolve, convincing affable audiences that war could be whimsical. For the prisoners of the Luftwaffe Staling 13, Schultz made an ideal witness to their eternal escape endeavors. His robustly repeated response, “I know nothing!” faithfully failed to fulfill his German superiors’ suspicions.

One can only imagine the proliferation of late 1960s era’s pretentious political philosophers chafing at the bemusement beckoned by Schultz’s channeling Socrates. The Socratic paradox, “I know that I know nothing,” back-translated to Katharevousa Greek, was relayed by Plato in Apology.

Apparently, Socrates attributed his wisdom to not imagining that he knows what he does not. At the intersection of Schultz and Socrates, humility and hilarity collide.

It was neither humor nor humbleness, but rather hubris, being highlighted in London on June 27, 2017 when Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen managed to make light of a heavy subject in a live televised Q&A with British Academy President Lord Nicholas Stern. Chuckling in response to one query, Yellen offered up the following on our collective financial future:

“Would I say there will never, ever be another financial crisis? You know probably that would be going too far. But I do think we’re much safer and I hope that it will not be in our lifetimes, and I don’t believe it will be.”

It was these last few words that ignited the ire of so many central banking detractors. Was she hoping we’d come to see the softer side of central banking?

Clearly, she takes faith in the radiation detection facilities the Fed has installed in the years since the worst of the financial crisis engulfed the global financial system. If not, why would she have also offered up these words of reassurance, that those at the Fed, “are doing a lot more to try to look for financial stability risks that may not be immediately apparent … in order to try to detect threats to financial stability that may be emerging.”