Reply #22: The Great Joseph Stiglitz Campaigned Openly for Treasury Job, and Was Snubbed

[Hidden Stillness]

One of the greatest people I ever heard on economics--to someone like me who knows almost nothing--has been the Nobel-Prize-winner Joseph Stiglitz. This Stiglitz is very clear on these huge and complicated issues, is a liberal, sounds like a New Dealer, a populist, someone who supports unions, public works projects, who knows the greatest stimulants to the economy are food stamps and unemployment benefits (as measured by amount spent, and amount returned to real economy), etc. Stiglitz explains things very well, and talks of the moral meaning of an economy as something that is controlled by, and for the benefit of, society--it is not a mathematical instrument for investors only. Joseph Stiglitz campaigned openly, as an Obama supporter, for the position of Treasury Secretary, and I was so excited thinking it might happen; Stiglitz would have been brilliant. The "Obama team" never even called.

These arguments that they had nowhere to turn, no path was even blazed, etc., would have been a lot more impressive if only several great people--I think Paul Krugman expressed interest, too--had not publicly expressed support and a great desire to help on any level.