3/29/2006

FREAKONOMICS - Economist for President

I have recently been thinking about purchasing this book for my reading pleasure. I came across a blog based on the book with a post titled "An Economist for President". In the blog post it discusses how the 2nd economist has been elected as the president of an African nation. My question is, do you think an economist can ever get elected in the United States, and if one did get elected would he/she do a good job?
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1 comment:

Dr. Tufte said...

Sorry Tom ... I dropped that little bit of megalomaniacal desire when I was 14.

Rico's thinking is most in line with mine. I tend to think that the problem is not the training of the people in charge but that we designed governments and gave them economic powers before we had a clue about how economics worked.

There are two interesting points to make. First off, did you know that economists were a key part in the Republican revolution in Congress during the 80s and 90s? Yep, Dick Armey was #2 in the House and Phil Gramm was #2 in the Senate, and both are former economics professors. Second, economists do tend to be found in disproportionate numbers in things like university and foundation presidencies. This is consistent with Bryce's suggestion.

FWIW: ROFL at Parker's comment about Joe Baker.

9:56 AM

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