President Donald Trump now has in place the man he wanted for chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, but there is concern about whether he'll be as free to do what he wants as the president envisioned.
In a very unusual move, the former chairman of the Fed, Jerome Powell, has decided not to abide by the customary rule of stepping down entirely from the board in addition to giving up the chairmanship.
The last time a Fed chairman stepped down but still kept a seat on the board was in 1948, nearly 80 years ago.
Powell's action caused some speculation that perhaps Powell intends to keep an eye on, and maybe even restrain, new Chairman Kevin Warsh, who's widely believed to be highly influenced by President Trump's wishes in guiding the economy.
And some people, such as White House Senior Counselor for Trade and Manufacturing Peter Navarro, who are watching this closely are even making references to Powell's "shadow Fed majority."
There are also experts such as Texas economist Dr. Vance Ginn who are enthusiastic about the new chairman, hoping he'll do a more thorough job in fighting inflation.
"My hope is that the new Fed chair, Kevin Warsh, will be much better about looking at what's going on with the economy," Ginn said.
"The Federal Reserve has done a poor job of maintaining low inflation."
And there are many who believe keeping down inflation is the Fed's number one job, so the fact that it keeps rising lately is a matter of concern.
Ginn says, "I've honestly been seeing a lot of inflation, the latest numbers have come out showing about 3.8-percent headline CPI [Consumer Price Index, the amount of money people are paying for goods] inflation lately, even excluding food and energy, which of course we all buy."
So there's good reason to hope that the Fed will do a much better job of protecting consumers from the ravages of inflation, sometimes referred to as a pernicious invisible tax, which could be a threat to housing, jobs and economic growth.