NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - If Alan Greenspan was hoping no one would notice when he steps down as Fed chairman next year, his policy decisions might just do the trick.

Of course, that's only part of what Greenspan is trying to do with its mind-numbing string of quarter-point rate hikes, always pointing to a continued "measured pace."

No doubt Federal Reserve policymakers really believe that this policy is the way to gradually rein in a growing economy before inflation kicks in.

But the policy makes it tough for us financial journalists to drum up suspense. We'd have to start making up stuff like, "the Fed is considering putting juicy pieces of gossip in the policy statement about which Fed bank president doesn't tip in restaurants." Even that might not do much good.

The one thing the markets do care about, however, is the "measured pace" guidance – when the M-word finally gets dropped, the thinking goes, perhaps the Fed will finally be done raising rates.

On that score, Marc Chandler of Scotia Capital Market is one of the few economists I've run across who thinks it's a possibility that "measured" will go.

"Not only is it hard to justify such a statement as rates approach some notion of equilibrium," he said, "the minutes also suggest increased uneasiness about such 'promises' from FOMC members."

Marc has been watching the Fed for a long time, but I'm siding with the majority view, as summed up by Dave Resler of Nomura Securities, an even longer-time Fedwatcher.

Said Resler: "As much as the minutes of the June meeting hinted at some members thinking the FOMC was closing in on neutrality, the markedly stronger economic outlook for the third quarter (at least), since then, should keep those voices very much in the background."

In trying to get a read on inflation, many are zeroing in on unit labor costs (the dreaded ULC's!) , which bounced a bit in July and which Greenspan worried about a bit in Congressional testimony last month.

Resler pooh-poohs them: "Never mind that ULCs have lagged inflation cycles more often than led them and that ULCs are a derived macro-statistic rather than a direct measure of wage-type pressures like the ECI (Employment Cost Index). On that point the ECI has actually been declining lately."

Supporting Resler's view, on Tuesday morning, the Labor Department reported that labor costs were held in check in the second quarter.

John Lonski of Moody's Investors Service is also skeptical that inflation is a problem and thinks that the bond market is too.

"A recent 4.4 percent 10-year Treasury yield hardly reflects expectations of ruinous inflation and with that an onerous federal funds rate," he said.

"Few businesses gripe about the need to either hike wages significantly," Lonski said. "If anything, the labor market remains a buyers' market."

So let's wrap this scintillating preview up with a view from the guys at Goldman Sachs, who are taking the rising ULC's seriously and who think that the Fed's punishingly regular policy moves will not abate for months.

"We now believe that the FOMC won't stop until the federal funds rate reaches 5 percent next spring," Goldman's Bill Dudley foresees. "Stronger growth, still easy financial conditions, a tighter labor market, and rising unit labor cost inflation all put pressure on the FOMC to keep going."

But there's more. Dudley suggests that as the Fed keeps raising short-term rates, long-term rates including those on mortgages will keep rising too. That, he thinks, could take the steam out of the housing sector and lead to a big slowdown in consumer spending.

A housing sector that's cooling off and homeowners that start spending less money? That sounds a bit more dramatic. And add to the mix the possibility of a new and untested Fed chairman and suddenly it looks like things in monetary policy land could get very interesting again.

I'll wake you up come spring.

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-- Kathleen Hays is economics correspondent for CNN and contributes to Lou Dobbs Tonight. You can read more of her columns here.