I think it was Harry Truman who said he was looking for an economist to advise him who only had one arm. Why? So the economist would never say, "On the other hand..."
Jeff Jacoby writes that one-armed economists are rare, indeed.
MORE STIMULUS, anyone? Should Washington order another hefty round of Keynesian deficit spending in order to spur the limping US economy?In conclusion:
Absolutely, say many prominent economists.
Peter Diamond, a 2010 recipient of the Nobel Prize for Economics, argues in favor of “pursuing valuable expenditures now,’’ by subsidizing state and local government payrolls and pouring money into “a vast amount’’ of construction projects. ...
So a big new stimulus package is the way to go?
Absolutely not, say many prominent economists.
Far from being the key to economic recovery, deficit “stimulus’’ will only make the economy worse, said Vernon Smith, who won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2002. His skepticism echoes that of yet another winner of the economics Nobel, Gary Becker: “There is no serious evidence,’’ Becker wrote in July, "that the $800 billion stimulus package passed over a year ago has had much stimulating effect on unemployment or GDP."
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