なんだかこれから反オバマのキーパーソンになってゆきそうな予感。。。
Politics & Policy January 20, 2011, 5:00PM EST
John Taylor: The Republicans' Shadow Fed Chairman
The Stanford University economist's blistering policy critiques have inspired GOP leaders By Scott Lanman
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_05/b4213026837780.htm
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linkedin connections He was among 23 signatories to an open letter to Bernanke in the Nov. 16 Wall Street Journal and New York Times, calling on him to halt the bond purchases. The next day the four top Republicans in Congress, including now-House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who had met with Taylor and other economists before the election, wrote to Bernanke expressing "deep concerns" over the purchases. Two weeks later, Taylor and Ryan, in an op-ed in Investor's Business Daily, wrote that "QE1 failed to strengthen the economy, which has remained in a high-unemployment, low-growth slump, and there is no convincing evidence that QE2 will help either."The silver-maned professor is popular among Stanford undergrads; sometimes he pretends to be the voice of Adam Smith, which he pipes in over loudspeakers during lectures. He stresses that he remains friends with both Greenspan and Bernanke. "I feel what I'm doing now, as much as I can, is getting the facts out," Taylor says in his office at Stanford's Hoover Institution, where the decorations include framed Iraqi currency he helped create.
Some economists say the Taylor Rule may not be the right prescription for today's economy. "Inflation is a little bit below the target, and unemployment is way above the target, so clearly we need more demand," says Jeffrey A. Frankel, a Harvard professor who was an economic adviser to President Bill Clinton.
Taylor's advice to GOP lawmakers: take away the Fed's discretion to set rates and make it follow a Taylor Rule, or similar recipe. He also proposes stripping the Fed of its mandate to pursue full employment, which Taylor says the Fed has used irresponsibly to justify QE2. Even some of his Fed allies are wary of his by-the-numbers approach. "This is no criticism of John: No model I know of replicates the real world," says Dallas Fed President Richard W. Fisher. Still, with the ear of so many Republicans, Taylor is likely to keep the Obama Administration and the Fed on the defensive for the next two years.
The bottom line: John Taylor's critiques of QE2 are inspiring Republican leaders to keep challenging Fed and White House economic policies.
Lanman is a reporter for Bloomberg News.
