A recent Wall Street Journal article describes
George P. Shultz is an American economist, statesman, and businessman. He served as the United States Secretary of Labor from 1969 to 1970, as the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury from 1972 to 1974, and as the U.S. Secretary of State from 1982 to 1989. Before entering politics, he was professor of economics at MIT and the University of Chicago, serving as Dean of the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business from 1962 to 1969. He is currently a distinguished fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
Michael J. Boskin is the T. M. Friedman Professor of Economics at Stanford University. In government he is best known for serving as chair of the Council of Economic Advisors under George H. W. Bush and as Chairman of a Congressional Advisory Commission on the Consumer Price Index.
Allan H. Meltzer is an American economist and professor of Political Economy at Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He is the author of dozens of academic papers and books on monetary policy and the Federal Reserve Bank, and is considered one of the world's foremost experts.
John B. Taylor is the Mary and Robert Raymond Professor of Economics at Stanford University, and the George P. Shultz Senior Fellow in Economics at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has said that Taylor's "influence on monetary theory and policy has been profound." Taylor is considered a likely future winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics.
In their WSJ article they conclude:
"The problems are close to being unmanageable now. If we stay on the current path, they will wind up being completely unmanageable, culminating in an unwelcome explosion and crisis."
"The fixes are blindingly obvious. Economic theory, empirical studies and historical experience teach that the solutions are the lowest possible tax rates on the broadest base, sufficient to fund the necessary functions of government on balance over the business cycle; sound monetary policy; trade liberalization; spending control and entitlement reform; and regulatory, litigation and education reform."
Note the obvious solutions include trade liberalization, broadening the tax base and not raising tax rates, regulatory reform, and education reform. Also, they implicitly warn that staying with the Obama administration's current policy choices will end with an unmanageable crisis and "explosion". And that is an understatement!
Clearly, the above, esteemed economists are in agreement that
Romney's plan also acknowledges that the availablity of cheap, abundant energy is uniquely necessary to boosting economic growth and middle class prosperity. Indeed, policies which prevent the use of America's energy wealth guarantee the continuing decline of the American middle class. And without a prosperous middle class the size of the tax base simply will never be sufficient to avoid a disastrous debt crisis.
Vice President Joe Biden recently said the middle class has been buried the last four years.3 Yes, and it is also clear that the policies of Obama's ideological government have not stopped the decline. The policy prescriptions of the Romney five-point plan will correct what ails the American economy.
-- Peter Cooper