The US economy could grow 4.5 per cent this year, Kansas City Federal Reserve President Mr Thomas Hoenig has said.
"I suspect we'll look back at 2004 as a year in which economic activity became more self-sustaining as it moves toward its longer-run potential growth rate," Mr Hoenig said early this morning.
Mr Hoenig, who rotated into a voting slot on the Fed's policymaking committee at the start of the year, said US gross domestic product probably grew at about 4 per cent last year and that this pace would be kept up this year and next.
He said the economy would continue to get help from tax cuts and stimulative financial conditions this year, adding that a 1 per cent federal funds rate meant the inflation-adjusted overnight rate was around zero.
This would help take up slack in the economy, he said, predicting job creation of 100,000 to 300,000 over the "next several months" as growth reached a self-sustaining level that would reduce the need for official stimulus.