Should the President be an Economist?

It's a very natural thought process to think that the person at the helm of the United States, who is the leader of the current leader of the world, should be an economist. After all, who better to understand the global consequences of his/her decisions?

Contextualizing decisions into a macroscopic viewpoint is a really big issue for a president in particular. It's hard to think globally, when the people that elect you are primarily thinking about themselves. They're not thinking domestically, they're not thinking about their state, or their city. Let's face it, for the most part, voters will vote for who they believe will increase their own standard of living the most.

This is sad, but it's true. In reality, Wall St. isn't that different from Main St. Everyone is greedy. But that's okay! We just have to accept it, understand it, and work around it.

With globalization ever more advanced, what may seem like good domestic decisions for the short term, can easily work its way around the world and ultimately bite us in the derriere (that's French for butt). See: Ethanol, the Farm Bill and commodities prices.

And with this in mind, Harvard Economist, Gregory Mankiw, wrote the following article for the New York Times: What if the Candidates Pandered to Economists?

I'm going to list for you the things Mankiw describes Presidential candidates should do to cater to economists, and the general stances of the two main candidates, Barack Obama and John McCain.

• Support Free Trade
  • Obama: heavily against NAFTA
  • McCain: relatively for it
• Oppose Farm Subsidies
  • Obama: one of the Farm Bill's biggest supporters
    
  • McCain: against the Farm Bill
    
• Leave oil companies and "speculators alone"
  • Obama: wants to investigate and regulate
    
  • McCain: wants to investigate and regulate
    
• Tax the use of energy
  • Obama: not necessarily wanting to raise energy taxes, but opposed the "gas tax holiday"
    
  • McCain: wanted to repeal taxes on oil this summer
    
• Raise the retirement age to deal with Social Security
  
  • Obama: raise taxes for wealthiest to support social security
    
  • McCain: decrease taxes, let individuals manage retirement
    
• Invite more skilled immigrants
  • Obama: catering to Latino vote, wants to legalize illegals
    
  • McCain: catering to Latino vote, wants to legalize illegals
    
• Liberalize drug policy
  • Obama: not clear, probably against it
    
  • McCain: not clear, probably against it
    
• Fund Economic research
  • Obama: yet to act on this matter
    
  • McCain: yet to act on this matter
    

I encourage you guys to read the whole article over at the New York Times for further detail into what economists really want from one of the leading economists in the nation. Although, the drug policy part seemed a bit silly. I mean, if he wants to associate personal freedom with marijuana use, why not heroin use? Or smoking and drinking for minors?

I think that there is a certain point where freedom must be controlled to take into account human faults. That's a big reason why we can't let the markets run completely wild. Otherwise, we'll have a housing implosion every 6 months.


Disclaimer: I'm an independent. Although, I have bias. Everyone has bias, unless they're liars.