Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard reiterated Tuesday his belief that the U.S. central bank needs to move “aggressively" with rate rises to help bring inflationary pressures back under control.

       “We need to get to neutral at least so that we’re not putting upward pressure on inflation during this period when we have much higher inflation than we’re used to in the U.S. economy," Mr. Bullard said in a Bloomberg television interview.

       Mr. Bullard was the sole dissenting voice at last week’s Federal Open Market Committee meeting. The Fed lifted its overnight target rate by a quarter percentage point and said more increases are coming, but Mr. Bullard voted in favor of a half percentage point increase.

       Mr. Bullard’s comments Tuesday followed remarks Monday from Fed chairman Jerome Powell, which were decidedly hawkish and suggested aggressive action from the central bank going forward. “We will take the necessary steps to ensure a return to price stability. In particular, if we conclude that it is appropriate to move more aggressively by raising the federal funds rate by more than 25 basis points at a meeting or meetings, we will do so," Mr. Powell said.

       Following Mr. Powell, economists at Goldman Sachs shifted their monetary policy forecast in a very hawkish direction. They now see half percentage point increases at both the Fed’s May and June meetings, followed by four 25 basis point rate increases at the remaining meetings of the year. More hikes are likely for next year, the Goldman Sachs economists said, but they also added, “we have left our forecast of the terminal rate unchanged at 3-3.25%."

       Mr. Bullard said that he sees aggressive moves ahead for the Fed as it moves toward a 2% federal funds rate, which he considers to be neutral. In terms of the pace of getting there, “50 basis point moves would definitely be in the mix," Mr. Bullard said.

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       Mr. Bullard also said in the interview that the U.S. can’t wait for a resolution of geopolitical issues to get monetary policy to a more appropriate setting where it is no longer pushing up already high inflation pressures.

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