Madmen, Intellectuals, and Academic Scribblers: The Economic Engine of Political Change

Edward J. López, Wayne A. Leighton (2013) Madmen, Intellectuals, and Academic Scribblers: The Economic Engine of Political Change. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. pp. xiv + 209. Madmen, Intellectuals, and Academic Scribblers presents a simple, economic framework for understanding the systematic causes of political change. Wayne A. Leighton and Edward J. López take up three interrelated questions: […]

What populists don’t understand about tariffs (but economists do)

Kimberly Clausing, Maurice Obstfeld  Οren Cass’s shallow and selective defense of Donald Trump’s trade policy proposals in The Atlantic misrepresents what economists know about tariffs. Agreed, Trump’s specific ideas—including minimum duties on all imports and the use of tariffs for commercial and foreign policy objectives—are unprecedented. Still, under Trump’s plan, the well-documented costs of tariffs will swamp the far more speculative benefits that Cass touts. Cass’s main critique […]