I Be Officially Right of Center Now?

As I am arguing on the same side as Henry Kaufman, and against the kind-hearted Mark Thoma, does the phrase “left-of-center” at the top of this blog have as much Memory Meaning as the Suzanne Vega song from Pretty in Pink?

Kaufman:

During the Greenspan years (1987-2006), the Fed clearly failed to recognize the significance of the many structural changes in the financial markets—such as the rapid growth of securitization and derivatives—on economic and financial behavior and thus for its monetary policy. The Fed also failed to foresee how the 1999 repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which had separated commercial from investment banking since 1933, would sharply accelerate financial concentration through mergers and acquisitions and thus contribute to the “too-big-to-fail” phenomenon.

Thoma:

The hope is that an independent Fed can overcome the temptation to use monetary policy to influence elections, and also overcome the temptation to monetize the debt, and that it will do what’s best for the economy in the long-run rather than adopting the policy that maximizes the chances of politicians being reelected.

On of those people lives in reality. The other, apparently, is a good econometrician.