WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Federal Reserve officials are "trying to wrap their head around" whether further improvement in inflation will require higher unemployment, with less help coming from improved supply chains and other forces that can lower price pressures on their own, Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee said on Thursday.

"What everybody is trying to wrap their head around now ... is are we back to the traditional tradeoff between employment and inflation?," Goolsbee said on CNN International.

"I still think there is some benefit that is coming down the pike ... but that is the central question as we think about the macroeconomy."