The Globe and Mail reports in its Friday edition that early in the Iran war, Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell was concerned about inflation. A New York Times dispatch to The Globe reports that over the past year, overall consumer price growth made little progress toward its 2-per-cent target. Inflation in services remained well above its 20-year average of 2.7 per cent. "It's frustrating," Mr. Powell said last month. The Fed needed to see progress on a multitude of fronts to feel confident about its grip on inflation, he said. Mr. Powell warned that without that, additional interest rate cuts would be hard to justify. Officials maintain that there is no urgency to move rates from their range of 3.5 per cent to 3.75 per cent, especially given heightened uncertainty around the war's resolution with a shaky ceasefire in place. But the longer the Fed misses on its inflation target, the more intense the pressure will be to address it. A growing cohort of Fed officials now appears open to the idea of a rate hike if inflation stays elevated for too long. Former Fed president James Bullard says if a policy-maker repeatedly explains why they missed the inflation goal every six months, they risk losing public credibility.