The Fed may be done, but can the economy get going?

Will this be the pause that refreshes? It looks like the Fed is ready to stop lowering rates, or at least take a breather after this week's quarter point drop. But as I wrote in The Times, it may be a few months before we know whether the government's recipe of lower rates and tax rebates was enough. Oil prices dropped a bit today on the news that the Fed may be done (lower rates hurt the dollar, which in turn leads to higher oil prices). Maybe that means we'll stop setting new records every day for gas prices. The average was $3.59 a gallon today in the Tampa Bay area--yikes!

I'm hoping that by fall we'll have some signs that things are picking up. I think we could use a little higher interest rates to help out retirees with their CDs and money market accounts.