Former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen spoke at George Washington University on Tuesday:
- coronavirus definitely "a potential influence on the global economy"
- seems certain to have a significant effect at least a quarter or two on Chinese growth
- China is a significant player in the global economy, there's bound to be "spillovers."
- remains an enormous amount of uncertainty about what will happen with the coronavirus and whether it will be contained
But ...
- economists have looked at what's happened with past epidemics such as the SARS outbreak in 2003, and typically, there's a short-term impact
- Longer-term, it seems to have relatively little influence, and I think many observers are hoping that will be true this time
