1. The only thing that the fed can do is manipulate interest rates to try to steer the economy. This is at best a blunt force tool and at worst a real negative impact on real life people.
2. The fed chair is appointed by a president and serves a long term but most of the actual federal reserve come from large banks -- we all know the ones -- the ones that were too big to fail and bribe congress critters (legally thanks to Citizens United) to not regulate them. So, what the fed does is as all microeconomics classes will tell you is really geared toward maximizing shareholder wealth in those banks.
3. Inflation is often manipulated for political reasons. OPEC nations can lower production, gas prices go up and that will trigger inflation. The recent inflation was overwhelmingly caused by greedflation of the virtual monopolies or colluding small groups that own most major sources of inflation (food production, grocery sales, etc) in most industries that have only a few companies that control the overwhelming percentage of the market. It is in the best interests of the megacorporations and their billionaire owners to stop Democrats and get Republicans elected because (R) will lower or eliminate corporate taxes and regulations. Gut working protections, and in general do everything to maximize shareholder wealth to their owners (oops, donors).
The problem with everything they teach in Macroeconomics (my son is taking AP Econ this year and we talk about it all the time) is that it is based on a bunch of assumptions that are no longer true. There is no real competition. Supply and demand can be manipulated by the two or three corporations who control entire industries (e.g., 90% of all poultry in the US goes through about 3 companies and their subsidiaries -- that allows them to keep pay to farmers low as they have basically allocated regionally who gets what and keep prices high as they have no real competition.)
Congress needs to step in but this is wheer the corporate overlords support of teh astroturf Tea Party first and MAGA movement second come in. A non-functioning government does not only not pass new laws, regulations, and taxes, but it is also unable to renew laws that are expiring that should have bipartisan support like Clean Water, Clean Air, etc.
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