The speed at which money moves between people and businesses in the United States lags well behind international standards. Far from being a mere inconvenience, slow payment speeds create needless financial uncertainty, lead to inefficiencies across the economy, and drive demand for high-cost credit products like payday loans and overdraft protection. To speed up the payment system, the Federal Reserve has announced “FedNow” a platform due in 2023 that would operate as a public real-time payment rail, competing with a privately-run platform in the interbank payment market.

This Article analyzes the problem of slow payments and the Fed’s many roles in addressing it. Against the Fed’s critics, we argue that the Fed’s operational involvement in the payment system holds the capacity to achieve three objectives at the heart of payment policy in the United States: to catalyze innovation, enhance access to developing payment networks, and shore up financial stability. Fed participation in the payment system and public-private competition are not troublesome bugs or unfortunate byproducts of political compromise. Rather, they represent valuable features of the Fed’s hybrid, public-private system and are likely to drive faster payment development in the United States.

We also argue for an expanded use of Fed tools to achieve payment objectives well beyond FedNow, including by using the Fed’s unique status as operator, market participant, regulator, and supervisor of the payment system and the private financial institutions that participate in it. These are different roles that can be harmonized for the same public policy outcome.