? have wide-ranging views about how to handle our current economic woes, as described in a new Business Week article.
Some of the most interesting policy prescriptions came out of a panel with five Nobel prize-winning economists, titled “Where is the World Economy Headed?” To stoke U.S. demand, Columbia University’s Robert Mundell, who won the prize in 1999, proposed the government hand out to consumers a half-trillion dollars’ worth of spending vouchers that have to be used within three months. “It would be a tremendous boost to the economy,” he said.
By contrast, 2006 Nobel laureate Edmund Phelps, also of Columbia, argued that stimulating household consumption was not the best remedy for the financial crisis. “Weren’t we all saying that households are overconsuming?” he asked. Instead, Phelps argued for the federal government to spend heavily on upgrades to the nation’s infrastructure. In addition, he said, the government should pass an investment tax credit, reduce the corporate income tax, and cut payroll taxes on low-wage jobs.
Perhaps you?d like to read some ideas from another economist.
