Bernanke: Lower Interest Rates Are "Feasible"

The economy jolted into reverse again in the summer. Many economists predict it is still shrinking now and will continue to do so through the first quarter of next year.

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Consumers — major shapers of national economic activity — likely will keep cutting back on their spending, he said Consumers have been reeling from job losses, hard-to-get credit and hits to their wealth from sinking home values and tanking portfolio investments.

In October, the unemployment rate zoomed to 6.5 percent, a 14-year high. So far this year, 1.2 million positions have disappeared. The jobless rate is likely to climb to 8 percent or higher next year.

A student of the Great Depression, Bernanke said the current period of economic woe bears "no comparison in terms of severity" to the 1930s.

Asked how he would like to be remembered as Fed chairman, Bernanke said: "I hope it would be that we got the financial crisis under control, that we set a groundwork for ... strong growth in our economy and that we began a process of healing."

On his point about mending, Bernanke acknowledged: "It's going to take a while."

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AP Business Writer John Porretto contributed to this report from Austin.

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