ANNE CASE & ANGUS DEATON The Princeton economists behind the “deaths of despair” thesis-Anne Case and Nobel Prize winner Angus Deaton-talk with Irwin Stelzer and Jeffrey Gedmin about their new book, the flaws of our economic and health care systems, and whether our national crisis could spur needed reforms. Irwin Stelzer and TAI Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey […]
A new battle for the direction of the economy is underway. The desire for freedom from doctor- prescribed sheltering at home is wrestling with fear of contracting the COVID-19. Pity the poor economist peering through the fog of that battle to determine which will prevail, whether the economy will resume its healthy upward trajectory as […]
LAWRENCE H. SUMMERS The former Treasury Secretary speaks with Irwin Stelzer and Jeffrey Gedmin on China, “decoupling,” reforming capitalism, and the shape of a post-pandemic fiscal policy. Published on: May 22, 2020 Irwin Stelzer and TAI Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Gedmin recently spoke with former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers in a wide-ranging conversation. They discussed […]
Certain: “settled, to be depended on” according to my OED. Certainty is a blessing reserved for the doctors predicting that doom awaits if several governors go through with plans to re-open their states’ economies. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government immunologist and telegenic spokesman for his colleagues, was so certain of their dire prediction that their […]
The coronavirus has proved that capitalism needs more than the mild medicine called “reform”; it needs judicious regulation if it is to survive. Not the growth-stymying regulation of the Obama years. But the sensible sort of regulation that that same President signed into law to restore stability to the financial sector. Proving there is regulation, […]
Out with the new, in with the old is the political rule as two septuagenarians, old white guys in blue suits as voters unhappy with the choice put it, face off for the presidency of the United States. Out with the old, in with the new, is the economic policy rule. Start with fiscal policy. […]
Enduring and fundamental changes are often forced upon us by events – the Great Depression and the New Deal’s reform of capitalism, the assassination of President Kennedy and his succession by Lyndon Johnson and his Great Society, the 2007-8 financial collapse and the ensuing restructuring and regulation of the financial sector to reduce the probability […]
The climate in America is changing. No, not that climate, the one that President Trump says is not changing at all. It is the policy climate, the one Trump has been trying desperately to change. Until now, the doctors have been controlling policy. Social-distancing, hand-washing (in addition to hand-wringing), masking, but definitely not working. America […]
There is no question that our airlines provide a network that moves people, goods, and mail around the country and overseas – essential to a prosperous and growing economy. Surely, it is in the national interest to see that they continue to operate. But that goal can be accomplished without bailing them out of the […]
In mid-March, 211,000 Americans applied for unemployment insurance, about the number that reflects normal job changes, and early in March 54% of small businesses said they were hiring. One week later, new applications for unemployment insurance soared to 3.3 million. Last week, just when private and commercial rents came due, that record number doubled, to […]