WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve took no new steps to support the economy Wednesday, but it said in a statement that it was ready to act if job growth did not improve. The statement, released after a meeting of the Fed’s policy-making committee, said that the rate of economic growth had slowed in recent months and was likely to remain “moderate over coming quarters.” As a result, the Fed said it expected the unemployment rate to decline “only slowly.” 
 
 But the central bank deferred any effort to improve the situation at least until the committee’s next scheduled meeting in mid-September. The FOMC promised to “closely monitor incoming information on economic and financial developments” and said it “will provide additional accommodation as needed.” 
 
 This is a slightly stronger promise that in June, when it said that it was “prepared to take action as appropriate.” 
 
 Ward McCarthy, chief financial economist at Jefferies, said the Fed is “ready to pull the trigger” if the bar of sustained improvement in the labor market is not met or if downside risks intensify. “This statement will at least raise some new doubts about whether the Fed will be easing again this year,” Jim O’Sullivan, chief United States economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote in a note to clients Wednesday. “We still expect they will, assuming that growth remains fairly sluggish, but for now at least the statement keeps the debate open.” 
 
 Mr. Bernanke will have an opportunity to clarify his views when he speaks at an annual monetary policy conference in Jackson Hole, Wyo., at the end of August. The decision to make what amounted to a conditional promise of action came Wednesday at the end of the central bank's two-day policy meeting. Among the 12 officials who vote on monetary policy, the only dissent from the decision to stand pat came from an official who has consistently pressed for the Fed to do less, Jeffrey M. Lacker, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. The central bank has held its benchmark rate near zero since late 2008, and said that it planned to maintain that policy at least until late 2014. Many economists are convinced the Fed will launch a new asset-purchase program, including the buying of mortgage-backed securities, at its next policy meeting in September. Last month, the Fed extended its Operation Twist program until the end of the year. “The training wheels need to come off the bike and the economy needs to be left alone,” he said.
– Wall Street has been waiting anxiously for a few days now to see what the Fed was going to do about the economy, and the answer arrived this afternoon: Nothing. For now. The Fed sees evidence that the economy has actually decelerated in recent months, reports MarketWatch, but it's not going to enter into new bond-buying or other such stimulus until the picture clarifies in the next month or two. Friday's jobs report might be the first indicator. In Fed-speak: “The committee will closely monitor incoming information on economic and financial developments and will provide additional accommodation as needed to promote stronger economic recovery and sustained improvement in labor market conditions," said its official statement. The Wall Street Journal parses the wording and thinks the Fed "signaled more strongly" that it will eventually take action. The New York Times, too, calls the language "somewhat stronger" than past statements.