Let’s say you are driving down the road, following your GPS and suddenly the navigation system says “rerouting.”

A couple of minutes later, it squeals “rerouting” again, and again and again.

Your trip is what you could call “data dependent.” You are following a series of instructions that are based on data, like traffic jams ahead, tolls, the quickest routes and such.

Or maybe your GPS is just broken and you will never get correct information and clear directions to where you are going.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has made it clear that whether the Fed raises interest rates, lowers them or stands pat, he is “data dependent” — those are his words and he has repeated them over and over.

The trouble is, government data on the economy are constantly flowing. So “data dependent” means that the Fed is constantly rerouting its plans based on whatever new bit of data has come out.

And there isn’t just one machine — each agency that monitors the economy has its own data.

Let me be clear: While I think that Powell’s Fed is aware of what the economic data are showing, I mostly think that the policy-making committee of the Fed is keeping an eye on what the financial markets are doing.

So, “data dependent” is a lie. Powell is really “market captive.” And worse, Powell’s Fed is also wary of what the president thinks.

When the stock market was forging ahead last year, Powell was talking about a continuation of his rate hikes into 2019. Even by his own admission, Powell thinks the US economy is doing just fine — something I agree with if fine is defined as better than most of the world and no faster than at the end of President Obama’s term.

Yet, suddenly, somewhere in the past month, Powell has gone from someone who the experts thought was going to raise rates at least two times in 2019 — and maybe even four times — to a guy who has now decided that there might not be any rate hikes.

Several things changed during that month. The government shut down and may shut again in a couple of weeks. The trade talks with China continued. And — this is the big one — the stock market threw a temper tantrum that caused equity prices to decline substantially.

Rerouting.

But here’s the problem. The Fed doesn’t have much control over real interest rates. Powell’s group moves the Fed funds rate, which is the price banks charge each other to borrow money, up and down. But the real rates that affect you and me are determined by the bond market.

So, if data say that the economy is humming and inflation fears rise, then interest rates are going to move higher no matter what the Fed wants.

Take last Friday, for instance. Interest rates rose sharply after the Labor Department announced a big jump in new jobs in January. Those 304,000 new jobs were twice as many as the “experts” had expected.

But, on the flip side, the number of new jobs that had previously been announced in December was lowered by about 50 percent.

How do you steer an economy with schizophrenic data like that?

So how can anyone make policy based on data dependency when the data keep shifting?

It’s just like a finicky GPS on your car. Follow those instructions and you will get lost.

And the Fed is lost. If we get a couple more months of good jobs reports — and those usually do occur in the spring — you’ll start hearing greater concerns about inflation followed by worries the Fed will raise interest rates again.