Good Ventures, the foundation created by Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and his wife, Cari Tuna, is supporting a campaign to persuade the Federal Reserve not to raise its target interest rate until the economy is stronger, the Washington Post reports.

Since 2014, Good Ventures has awarded grants totaling $850,000 to the Center for Popular Democracy in support of the "Fed Up" Campaign, which aims to dissuade the Federal Reserve from prematurely moving to tighten monetary policy and calls for greater transparency and public engagement from the Fed. "The central reason we believe that marginally more dovish Fed policy relative to the current baseline would carry net benefits is that, at roughly their current rates, we see unemployment as more costly in humanitarian terms than inflation," the foundation stated in a GiveWell grant write-up explaining its decision to fund the effort.  

Last week, the campaign stepped up its presence at the Fed's annual economic policy symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, presenting a petition with more than a hundred and ten thousand signatures cautioning Fed governors against taking action that could slow the economy and hurt working families, conducting teach-ins, and drawing the support of prominent economists, including Nobel laureate and Roosevelt Institute chief economist Joseph Stiglitz, University of California, Berkeley professor Brad DeLong, and Center for Economic and Policy Research co-director Dean Baker.

"Whether it likes it or not, what the Federal Reserve does has significant effects on inequality in our country," said Stiglitz. "It is time for the Fed to take greater recognition of this, since there are many channels through which its policies impact inequality and affect American workers and families, and reshape its policies accordingly."

The foundation acknowledges, however, that the chances of influencing the Federal Open Market Committee's interest rate decisions are slim. "Our best guess is that the campaign is unlikely to have an impact on the Fed's monetary policy," it stated in its grant summary, "but that if it does, the benefits would be very large."