Economic guru Jeremy Siegel remains bullish and optimistic for the new year despite the looming prospect of higher interest rates.

“My feeling is, is the rates are going to be going up and we're going to have a good economy this year,” he recently told CNBC.

“I don't think you're going to get rates that are going to stay” at current levels.

“I think you're going to get those four increases. I think that you're going to see the 10-year bump above 3%,” he said.

“I don't think any infrastructure is really going to get done. The Democrats can block anything that they want to you know, I think they think they're winning by stonewalling whatever the Republicans' programs are going to be,” he said.

“I think there is going to be a DACA deal with some money thrown at security, but, you know, that's about it,” he said.

Meanwhile, Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank President Patrick Harker said he believes the central bank should raise rates just two times this year, fewer than most of his rate-setting colleagues, as low inflation continues to dog the U.S. economy.

The dovish turn for Harker, a supporter last year of all three of the Fed’s interest-rate increases, signals a rising concern over the central bank’s ability to revitalize inflation using its current 2-percent inflation target. Harker as recently as November said he expected three rate hikes to be appropriate for 2018, Reuters reported.

Though unemployment has fallen to 4.1 percent, below what many economists see as full employment, wages have failed to pick up strongly, and inflation weakened rather than gained over the course of 2017.

Harker, in remarks prepared for delivery at the annual American Economic Association, said Friday he expects the economy to grow a bit slower than 2.5 percent. He forecasts unemployment will stay low this year before rising a few tenths of a percentage point next year, and inflation to push above 2 percent in 2019 before coming back to the Fed’s target in 2020. There is “little slack” left in the labor market, he said.

But, he said, “if soft inflation persists, it may pose a significant problem,” including making it ever more difficult to bring inflation back to healthy levels. “For that reason, my own view is that two rate increases are likely to be appropriate for 2018.”

Most Fed officials expect three rate hikes this year, forecasts released last month show.

(Newsmax wire services contributed to this report).