Not tapering and all that goes with that can be called their push back vs higher mtg rates, in that tapering would have signaled they were ok with the higher rates.

A close ally of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, Dudley highlighted the drags from the sharp recent rise in longer-term interest rates, higher taxes and lower public spending adopted earlier this year, and questions over the U.S. debt limit and government funding as Congress meets this autumn.

Dudley also said the Fed could “wait a long time” to raise interest rates once the unemployment rate hits a 6.5 percent threshold.

Atlanta Fed boss Dennis Lockhart said the labor market still needed a spark to continue its recovery, Dow Jones reported.

“We see a picture in which fewer firms are expanding employment, and each expanding firm is adding fewer new jobs on average than in the past,” Lockhart said, according to a report, adding that the “employment dynamics of the U.S. economy are slower.”