Dissent

President Obama and Vice-President Biden have implied that the economics profession is unanimous in its support of a massive fiscal spending package. This is not the case. Click here to find a message to President Obama signed by prominent economists from some of the nation's finest universities across the nation. The list includes James Butkiewicz and Ellie Craig, two of my favorite professors at my Alma Mater, the University of Delaware.

Here is their statement:
Notwithstanding reports that all economists are now Keynesians and that we all support a big increase in the burden of government, we do not believe that more government spending is a way to improve economic performance. More government spending by Hoover and Roosevelt did not pull the United States economy out of the Great Depression in the 1930s. More government spending did not solve Japan's "lost decade" in the 1990s. As such, it is a triumph of hope over experience to believe that more government spending will help the U.S. today. To improve the economy, policy makers should focus on reforms that remove impediments to work, saving, investment and production. Lower tax rates and a reduction in the burden of government are the best ways of using fiscal policy to boost growth.