NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - It's a big day in the annals of Federal Reserve history today: the Fed is releasing the minutes of its last meeting three weeks early!

Now, for a lot of people, this may not sound like a big deal. It's not like the Fed didn't ever release its meeting minutes to the public; it just used to wait six weeks to make sure they were as stale as possible so they would not "roil" the financial markets (love that word, whatever it means).

For the Fed, however, this is a step toward being a bit more open about what's on their mind and where policy may be heading. True, the minutes are edited, sanitized, and scrutinized so that only what the Fed wants us to hear gets out, but getting them more quickly can only be a good thing.

The Fed last met on December 10, and they voted to raise their key short-term rates again, and they said again policy remains "accommodative." And that means officials think rates are too low so more rate hikes are coming.

Everyone expects the Fed to keep raising rates, and a lot of Wall Street types figure that the fed funds rate, now at 2.25 percent, will be pushed up to around 3.5 percent.

Will we get any clues in the minutes today?

The more the minutes talk about strength in the economy and expectations for stronger jobs growth, and the more references there are to building price pressures -- inflation -- the more rate hikes could lie ahead.

If there are any doubts about the economy's momentum, that could point to fewer rate hikes. Given that everyone expects rates to keep moving higher, at meeting after meeting this year, these minutes won't create fireworks. But let's applaud the Fed for taking a step in the right direction.

Now, if they could just allow TV cameras in those meetings....  

Kathleen Hays is economics correspondent for CNN and contributes to Lou Dobbs Tonight.