When I returned from a year serving as the chief economist on the staff of the Council of Economic Advisers in 2004 and began my tenure as director of the Nelson A. Rockefeller Center, I started blogging. From 2004 to 2008, I posted at a sole-authored blog, Vox Baby. For the next three years, I joined a group effort at Capital Gains and Games. I then returned to a sole-authored blog. With the exception of the first three months of the first blog, all posts prior to 2021 have been imported into this site and are accessible in the sidebar to the right. (Those three months can be found here, here, and here.) Each post reflects my perspective at the time of its posting and should not be taken to reflect the views of any person or organization with which I am affiliated or to necessarily reflect my views today.
While the last blog is still active, in recent years, I have essentially stopped blogging, for three reasons. The first is that the blogosphere has become more crowded with commentary. Some of it is quite good. I would be less of a unique voice today than in 2004, before Twitter and other social media saturated the Internet with opinions. The second is that I said most of what I wanted to say in my early years of blogging. The third is that politics, and thus political commentary, have gotten far too unpleasant to command as much of my bandwidth as they did so many years ago. Let's just say I am on sabbatical for a while.
Below are links to other commentary I've posted over the years. Most of it has to do with suggestions for more fiscal and financial responsibility in federal policy making.
- “The Fiscal Grand Canyon,” The New York Daily News. January 6, 2013. Discussed as a Must Read on Morning Joe on January 7, 2013.
- “A Better Approach to Stimulus Spending,” US News and World Report, Economic Intelligence Blog. November 30, 2012.
- “Main street gets government help too,” National Public Radio Marketplace Commentary. October 6, 2008.
- “We need a carbon tax on gasoline,” National Public Radio Marketplace Commentary. June 2, 2008.
- “Life is unfair, and so is the bailout,” National Public Radio Marketplace Commentary. March 17, 2008.
- “A Capital Idea: A Budget that Plans for the Future,” The Ripon Forum, Volume 42, No. 1, February/March 2008, 27-28.
- “A Better Way to Deal with Downturns,” The Washington Post. January 27, 2008.
- “It’s Not a Stimulus, It’s Deficit Spending,” National Public Radio Marketplace Commentary. January 25, 2008.
- “Save the Homeowners, Not Hedge Funds,” Providence Journal. August 31, 2007. (with Dean Baker). [Link broken, cross-post at Vox Baby]
- “Stitching a New Safety Net,” Wall Street Journal Online. Econoblog, February 7, 2006 (with Mark Thoma). [Link broken, commentary at Mark Thoma's blog]
- “Shopped Out?” Wall Street Journal Online. Econoblog, August 31, 2005 (with Barry Ritholtz).
- “The Economic Crystal Ball: Cloudy, or Clearing?” Wall Street Journal Online, Econoblog, December 30, 2004 (with John Irons).
- “401(k)s beat out older pensions,” USA Today, Page 15A, Column 1. Editorial, September 17, 2002 (with Jonathan Skinner).