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Interview with Obama
This is exactly the sort of link which MR normally shuns. But it really is worth reading. David Leonhardt runs the interview. I do not agree with Obama on all points but he understands economic policy better than do most professional economists, whether Democrats, Republicans, etc.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on April 29, 2009 at 04:17 PM in Economics, Political Science | Permalink
Comments
"I do not agree with Obama on all points but he understands economic policy better than do most professional economists, whether Democrats, Republicans, etc."
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but come on!
You lose any credibility that you had remaining as a serious economist with stupid statements such as these.
You're increasingly revealing yourself to be nothing more than one of those silly GMU economists who apparently don't do anything but blog, talk, and eat all day. No serious research, no serious or real contribution to academics or knowledge.
We know that you abandoned any ambition for real academic work or research, or to contributing to knowledge in general, a long, long time ago in order to become more known by the public, and the play the public's idea of what or who an "economist" is. So I suppose this is a lame attempt to try to curry favor and wiggle your way into becoming some sort of policy entrepreneur.
Do everyone a favor, and stop calling yourself an "economist." You are a dilletante, and nothing more.
Posted by: delaney at Apr 29, 2009 4:38:37 PM
Just think how insulting you could be if you meant to be disrespectful.
Posted by: beamish at Apr 29, 2009 4:51:42 PM
More crap about how a prosperous economy is impossible without ever
increasing loans to consumers, therefore taxpayers have to give hundreds
of billions to banks to make them "healthy".
Obama is peddling absolute horseshit on the first page of the interview.
The same kind of crap that led to Tyler saying:
"The Paulson Plan is better than nothing".
Posted by: Gabe at Apr 29, 2009 4:55:30 PM
"I mean, the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill out here."
"So how do you — how do we deal with it?"
Indeed.
Posted by: Andrew at Apr 29, 2009 4:57:45 PM
delaney,
Um, just for the record, Tyler continues to write research papers that get
accepted and published in reasonably respectable economics journals. He does
not generally talk about these here or in other public fora he participates in,
but that he does not do so does not mean that he is not doing such things.
Indeed, I, like many others, are amazed that he is able to do as many things
as he manages to do.
Frankly, you owe him an apology, although I doubt that he will demand or expect
one. You are an ignorant disgrace.
Posted by: Barkley Rosser at Apr 29, 2009 5:03:09 PM
Gabe,
Did you even read the first page of the interview? It was a pretty uncontroversial summary of what has happened in the bubble and the healthy corrections that are now happening as a result of the free market.
Posted by: Aguirre at Apr 29, 2009 5:18:13 PM
@Andrew: That jumped out at me, too. The whole conversation in the news recently about "swine flu will have a negative economic effect" is the same ghoulish vein. Clearly, we should just outlaw abortion and birth control, but mandate euthanasia for anyone older than 65.
Posted by: Joshua Allen at Apr 29, 2009 5:23:15 PM
"I do not agree with Obama on all points but he understands economic
policy better than do most professional economists, whether Democrats, Republicans, etc."
If this is the case, that a lawyer and activist can grasp economic policy more than
"most professional economists", than there is no profession of economics, because one can
acquire better knowledge through aptitude or unrelated experience. Of course, you
are a professional economist, so why should we trust you? To judge proficiency, you must
be proficient.
What a pathetic attempt at sycophantic hyperbole.
Posted by: Phil at Apr 29, 2009 5:25:16 PM
Perhaps it's because we were starved for this the past 8 years, but I'm most impressed with how thoughtful the President is, how he admits he doesn't have all the answers, and how willing he is to pubicly speak his mind, rather than spout pre-cooked soundbites to carefully selected audiences.
When I disagree with Obama's policy positions, I find myself taking a second look at my own positions and really trying to fairly consider his views.
Posted by: JackTrade at Apr 29, 2009 5:29:04 PM
Phil,
I absolutely agree with you. Very well put.
Barkley Rosser,
You are an ignorant Communist. Furthermore, your life's work has consisted of developing pseudoscientific theories through wrongheaded applications of mathematical/systems theories.
Posted by: delaney at Apr 29, 2009 5:41:05 PM
@Phil: Economics and economic policy are not the same thing. Tyler did not claim that Obama understands economics better than most professional economists, but that he understands economic policy better than most professional economists. I would not be surprised if that is true, because most professional economists work in areas that do not require translating theory or observation into policy, and therefore have not learned the skills necessary to do so.
Posted by: Peter at Apr 29, 2009 5:45:28 PM
@Phil:
1) It seems possible that many economists understand their research niche but do not really understand the big picture (they are not really incentivized to). The "economics" that Obama understands might be this sort of big-picture, synthesized view.
2) Suppose your chief economics advisers were all brilliant people who had worked in advisory roles before, and you spent 2 hours every day having them explain to you what all the relevant intuitions are for thinking about the economics of public policy. Is it really impossible that you could wind up with a better set of intuitions than many economists?
Even if you were simply parroting their intuitions, you would be parroting the views of people who are (let's assume) more likely to be right than the average economist.
Of course this sort of high-intensity individualized tutorship (2 hours a day of Larry Summers' time) is not remotely scalable as a general pedagogical method for non-VIPs. But it is feasible and worthwhile under certain conditions, for example if you are the president of a powerful country and your decisions might wreck or save markets.
In other words, Obama is in a very specialized situation with very unusual resources at his disposal and under those circumstances it is difficult for me to believe he couldn't learn the important broad contours of economics very quickly.
I'm sure Obama's not some genius, but he does seem thorough and on-task , and under the circumstances I think that is the more relevant quality.
Posted by: mk at Apr 29, 2009 5:52:08 PM
Obama has shown a remarkable ability to process intellectual thought. I do think that it may be the case that his performance in this interview is more a result of spending months talking with a bunch of top economists rather than any true economic understanding of his own. But there's definitely something there.
The concern is that people forget that Obama is a lawyer. Lawyers who are tasked with promoting a side in an argument learn to understand the opposing argument, hopefully better than the opposition does. But they don't use their understanding of all the arguments to reach a more accurate conclusion; they use their understanding of all the arguments to promote the view they started with in the first place.
Posted by: Andrew Berman at Apr 29, 2009 5:55:45 PM
We can tell that delaney has no argument when he resorts to ad-hominem attacks.
Posted by: Chris at Apr 29, 2009 6:17:04 PM
First!
Posted by: delaney at Apr 29, 2009 6:51:45 PM
I've been entertaining the thought that delaney is elaborate satire.
Posted by: dth at Apr 29, 2009 6:53:02 PM
Yahbut, Bush didn't say we needed a revolution in finance, energy, and healthcare. For example, he wants to cure the business cycle. Obama cannot possibly be that thoughtful. We thought we had cured the business cycle. Now we know the name for that is hubris.
Well, maybe we do need a revolution in those areas, but more likely we need an evolution. Most times you have a revolution, just means you will need another one in short order.
Posted by: Andrew at Apr 29, 2009 6:55:45 PM
Forgive my ignorance, but it does not jump out at me as obvious that a sophisticated understanding of economics would necessarily translates into an understanding of economic policy. Economic policies are concerned with (a) inducing a desired effect in the economic system, and (b) actually being implemented as law. I would imagine that a great deal of game theory and system analysis would be involved in the former, although probably not in a very formalized way, and that a lot of politicking and compromise would go into the latter. In both circumstances, one would need a lot of knowledge (about bureaucracies, companies, competing interests, interest groups, and politicians) that cannot be gained simply by studying economics in an academy.
I do not see a lot of pragmatic solutions being offered by economists, I must say. Generally the suggestions are legislatively impossible. Determining economic policy is perhaps more a matter of deciding which of the feasible yet inadequate responses will be most useful, both economically and politically, in the long run.
Posted by: sleepy_commentator at Apr 29, 2009 7:02:21 PM
delaney is a troll. Ignore him.
Posted by: Bill at Apr 29, 2009 7:06:35 PM
I see a lot of comments distinguishing between economics and economic policy, thereby excusing economists for failing to economic policy as well as Obama. But if economists could not reasonably be expected to know economic policy well then what would be the point of Tyler's comparison?
But what if Tyler said, instead, that Obama knew economics better than most professional economists? Would that be credible? It might actually be credible, though it would not say very much about Obama, considering that professional economists seem not to know their own subject very well, as was mentioned in this blog four years ago.
Posted by: Constant at Apr 29, 2009 7:18:20 PM
I question whether you can infer much from this type of media interview. From my limited experience the basic questions usually have to be submitted in advance. So President Obama is essentially reading from a script, with some degree of improvisation in response to the follow-up questions.
Posted by: Paul Johnson at Apr 29, 2009 7:22:42 PM
Jacktrade and other sycophants:
There's nothing special about Obama or his rhetoric. You tube is becoming a repository for for his vacant, "uh" laced stuttering. I especially like the clip where he talks about a war on "privacy" (freudian slip?). He's managed to PO the UK, appoint a series of tax cheats to high office, including one to be in charge of the IRS, treat foreign dictators with more respect than domestic political opponents and treat a major city to a collective heartattack for the purposes of a photo opportunity. Then there's the little matter of the purposeful expansion of expected deficits. If there was a press that was actually independent, rather than acting like adjunct press officers-we wouldn't have so many weak minded robots acting like they were some middle-age town visiting by the king.
Peter:
Your distinction between economics and economic policy is reaching and fallacious, however, if I stipulate the difference-Tyler is still a member of the group he claims is lacking relative to Obama.
Jacktrade:
I find it difficult to accept the judgment of someone who's impresses with how Obama is willing to "pubicly" speak his mind.
Posted by: Phil at Apr 29, 2009 7:26:00 PM
I think "delaney" might be Bryan Caplan trying to be funny or something.
Posted by: Waverly Sohn at Apr 29, 2009 7:26:04 PM
First sentence from Obama in the interview:
"Well, first of all, I think that we should distinguish between finance as the lifeblood of our economy and finance as a significant industry where we have a comparative advantage — right?"
I'm trying hard not to swoon, here, because I'm a libertarian but HOLY CRAP IT FEELS GOOD TO HAVE AN INTELLIGENT PRESIDENT. He used the words "comparative advantage" in his first sentence SQUUEEEEE...
Posted by: Eliezer Yudkowsky at Apr 29, 2009 7:29:14 PM
Oh come on, that opportunity cost thing was just silly. I think the Stand-up Economist nailed this: if I offer you one Snickers bar, that's great, but if I offer you a choice of a Snickers bar or less-desirable M&Ms you have to factor in the opportunity cost of not taking the M&Ms, and if I offer you the choice of two identical Snickers bars I've really screwed you over. Opportunity cost is a non-trivial idea but it's not something that takes an advanced economics education to understand.
Posted by: Barbar at Apr 29, 2009 7:31:02 PM
