United States Economy

Subterms

    More stories

    • 88 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      How Joe Biden Can Unify the Country

      by

      We had asked readers what they thought was the greatest challenge facing the president-elect and what advice they would give him. We published several responses on Saturday. Below are a few more, reflecting the most common answer: the need to heal a divided country.To the Editor:Joe Biden’s greatest challenge will be trying to win the trust of the more than 73 million people who voted for President Trump. This matters if we are ever to have a chance of returning to some form of normalcy.Proposal: During his first 100 days he should hold town halls with just Trump voters. He should ask them to share what most worries them. He should listen carefully. After those town halls he should report publicly on what concerns were most prevalent, and what concrete steps his administration will be taking to try to address those concerns in a reasonable and balanced way.David ShineArmonk, N.Y.To the Editor:President Biden’s big challenge will be unifying the country. He should take a page from F.D.R.’s playbook and bring back some form of the “fireside chat.”Barack Obama was a great president but aloof. He needed to toot his own horn, let the country know about his administration’s good work. Donald Trump, on the other hand, crowed about make-believe accomplishments and insulted the intelligence of many Americans.Joe Biden is warm, honest and genuine. He may not win over all disbelievers, but it can’t hurt to let everyone know on a regular basis that he cares, what his administration is working on to revive America and why folks shouldn’t believe untrue allegations coming from the opposition.How great it would be to have a president who treats us all as adults!John StearnsMountain View, Calif.To the Editor:Joe Biden will have any number of “greatest challenges” to choose from, but the greatest — and arguably most important — will be to bring as many Trump supporters as possible on board with the notion that Mr. Biden is the president of all of us, not just those who voted for him. It has been four long years since we had such a president, and it won’t be easy.Therefore I suggest that Mr. Biden begin immediately to contact influencers in sports, film, music, theater, motorcycle enthusiasts — people who supported President Trump but who can see the value in a nation united rather than divided. Make them presidential emissaries, or ambassadors, who will take to social media and television (Fox News, for instance) in order to reach the people who need to hear the message.And it is a simple one: I know how you feel, because I also voted for Mr. Trump. I’m as disappointed as you are. But I also know that this nation is suffering in many ways, and we have to fix this. Are you with me?Linda LevyLawrenceville, N.J.To the Editor:The greatest challenge to the Biden presidency, and to the country as a whole, is this fact: Almost 50 percent of our nation believes Trumpian rhetoric. President Trump’s lies run the gamut of disinformation, from the corruption of science (the severity of Covid is a hoax; climate change isn’t dangerous) to the corruption of American values.The Biden administration must undo the damage done by Trumpian disinformation. Mr. Biden should mount a nationwide communications campaign to bring science and our national values back to our social dialogue. Educate people about how democracy is destroyed. Or saved.In addition, Mr. Biden should push to strike down or modify Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act. Internet providers must take responsibility, as publishers do, for spreading lies, hate and disinformation.Celia Watson SeupelHigh Falls, N.Y.To the Editor:The greatest challenge facing Joe Biden’s presidency is holding the two wings of the Democratic Party together. If he succeeds, the Democrats may be able to achieve some of their goals. Without control of the Senate, he would have to confine himself to issues popular with the general public.He should aim for what progressives might consider insufficient: protecting and improving Obamacare to bring it closer to universal health care, assistance for displaced workers and job training, reinstating pollution controls canceled by President Trump, an increase in the minimum wage, a substantial pandemic stimulus program, paid parental and sick leave, universal pre-K and easing the cost of higher education.Progressives should understand that achieving even modest goals in the next two years is essential to electoral success in 2022, after which more aggressive programs may be within reach. Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, defunding the police and decriminalizing illegal immigration are nonstarters. If the progressive wing holds out for more, it will achieve nothing now or later. Mr. Biden’s most important battle will be maintaining unity within his own party.Stephen W. SteinNew YorkTo the Editor:Joe Biden’s biggest challenge will be to unite this country so we can all pull in the same direction to defeat Covid, restart the economy, fight racial injustice, open up economic opportunities across all social classes and regain respect around the world.Of utmost importance, he must help us renew our faith in, and dedication to, our democratic values and institutions. My advice? Keep being who you are: calm, confident, compassionate and communicative.Surround yourself with highly qualified and ethical public servants who reflect the diversity of the country. Step across the aisle, listen and compromise. Move us forward. Restore our spirit and pride. Don’t give up. Don’t let our democracy die. We need you desperately.Myra FournierBedford, Mass. More

    • 88 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      In Praise of Janet Yellen the Economist

      by

      It’s hard to overstate the enthusiasm among economists over Joe Biden’s selection of Janet Yellen as the next secretary of the Treasury. Some of this enthusiasm reflects the groundbreaking nature of her appointment. She won’t just be the first woman to hold the job, she’ll be the first person to have held all three of the traditional top U.S. policy positions in economics — chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, chair of the Federal Reserve and now Treasury secretary.And yes, there’s a bit of payback for Donald Trump, who denied her a well-earned second term as Fed chair, reportedly in part because he thought she was too short.But the good news about Yellen goes beyond her ridiculously distinguished career in public service. Before she held office, she was a serious researcher. And she was, in particular, one of the leading figures in an intellectual movement that helped save macroeconomics as a useful discipline when that usefulness was under both external and internal assault.Before I get there, a word about Yellen’s time at the Federal Reserve, especially her time on the Fed’s board in the early 2010s, before she became chair.At the time, the U.S. economy was slowly clawing its way back from the Great Recession — a recovery impeded, not incidentally, by Republicans in Congress who pretended to care about national debt and imposed spending cuts that significantly hurt economic growth. But spending wasn’t the only issue of debate; there were also fierce arguments about monetary policy.Specifically, there were many people on the right condemning the Fed’s efforts to rescue the economy from the effects of the 2008 financial crisis. Among them, by the way, was Judy Shelton, the totally unqualified hack Trump is still trying to install on the Fed board, who warned in 2009 that the Fed’s actions would produce “ruinous inflation.” (Hint: They didn’t.)Even within the Fed, there was a division between “hawks” worried about inflation and “doves” who insisted that inflation wasn’t a threat in a depressed economy, and that fighting the depression should take priority. Yellen was one of the leading doves — and a 2013 analysis by The Wall Street Journal found that she had been the most accurate forecaster among Fed policymakers.Why did she get it right? Part of the answer, I’d argue, goes back to academic work she did in the 1980s.At the time, as I’ve suggested, useful macroeconomics was under attack. What I mean by “useful macroeconomics” was the understanding, shared by economists from John Maynard Keynes to Milton Friedman, that monetary and fiscal policy could be used to fight recessions and reduce their economic and human toll.This understanding didn’t fail the test of reality — on the contrary, the experience of the early 1980s strongly confirmed the predictions of basic macroeconomics.But useful economics was under threat.On one side, right-wing politicians turned away from reality-based economics in favor of crank doctrines, especially the claim that governments can conjure up miraculous growth by cutting taxes on the rich. On the other side, a significant number of economists themselves rejected any role for policy in fighting recessions, claiming that there would be no need for such a role if people were acting rationally in their own interests, and that economic analysis should always assume that people are rational.Which is where Yellen came in; she was a prominent figure in the rise of “new Keynesian” economics, which rested on one key insight: People aren’t stupid, but they aren’t perfectly rational and self-interested. And even a bit of realism about human behavior restores the case for aggressive policies to fight recessions. In later work Yellen would show that labor market outcomes depend a lot not just on pure dollars-and-cents calculations, but also on perceptions of fairness.All this may sound abstruse, but I can vouch from my own experience that this work had a huge impact on many young economists — basically giving them a license to be sensible.And it seems to me that there’s a direct line from the disciplined realism of Yellen’s academic research to her success as a policymaker. She was always someone who understood the value of data and models. Indeed, rigorous thinking becomes more, not less important in crazy times like these, when past experience offers little guidance about what we should be doing. But she also never forgot that economics is about people, who aren’t the emotionless, hyperrational calculating machines economists sometimes wish they were.Now, none of this means that things will necessarily go well. The race is not to the swift, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet success to policymakers of understanding, but time and chance happen to them all. Trump’s cabinet was a clown show — possibly the worst cabinet in America’s history — but it wasn’t until 2020 that the consequences of the administration’s incompetence became fully apparent.Still, it’s immensely reassuring to know that economic policy will be made by someone who knows what she is doing.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More