Despite Harry Truman’s crack about the need for a one-handed economist, well-trained economists who advise politicians usually share agreement on many principles. Unfortunately for those who work for politicians, their work often requires them to cobble together and support policies at odds with those principles. In When the President Calls, New York University economist Simon Bowmaker interviews several economists from the Nixon administration to the Trump administration who have been put in that position. The book gives readers a sense of the advisers’ individual personalities and the substantive economic input they provided to the president.

The book offers little-known anecdotes and White House gossip that provide plenty of humor. For example, the late Paul O’Neill, who was treasury secretary in the George W. Bush administration, said this about the president he served:

I honestly have no clue how Bush 43 thought about economics. My meetings with him were absolutely unmemorable…. He can’t be very proud of what he did.

Concerning the priorities of Bush’s chief political adviser, Karl Rove, O’Neill said, “It was about winning votes and winning elections. Doing the right thing was more an afterthought.”

Bowmaker spends considerable time on each administration’s crises and how each policymaker provided substantive input to the president. But the gossip is a nice bonus.

Ties that bind / The first question Bowmaker asks each economic adviser is why he or she got into economics. Despite the partisan and ideological diversity of the group, they are generally free traders, recognize there is no such thing as a free lunch, understand incentives and tradeoffs, and recognize the importance of benefit–cost analysis. There are several unifying traits among the group, as economics is their common “religion” in many respects, not politics.

The book includes plenty of economic giants: Paul Volcker, Alan Greenspan, Joseph Stiglitz, Greg Mankiw, Glenn Hubbard, and John B. Taylor, among others. Greenspan was hardly shy in describing his experiences with different presidents. When naming the two “sharpest,” Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon were his choices. Apparently, Clinton would read three or four books a week as president. Greenspan remarked, “It is an extraordinary intelligence. How he ended up as a politician I do not know, but he is very impressive.” Generally, appreciation for Clinton was strong among the economists surveyed.

Despite the stereotypes of rigid analytical and quantitatively driven minds, many of the economists were in positions of administrative power and had to marshal an array of “soft” skills and abilities. For example, W. Michael Blumenthal, who served as treasury secretary under Jimmy Carter, noted how important emotional intelligence was during his tenure. With a team of other experts in the White House and supporting agencies, economic advisers have to trust their subordinates and rely on their judgment.

Blumenthal remarked, “Politicians are cowards. They are followers, not leaders, in most instances.” For economists trying to dole out good advice, this cowardice sometimes can be an asset, but other times the lack of conviction can lead the nation down a less optimal path. All the advisers provided plenty of candid commentary on this, and they avoided broad platitudes and bland rhetoric.

The interviewees commonly believed that elected officials viewed economists as too wonkish, as being “incomprehensible spewers of jargon.” In response, the economists generally viewed their bosses as lacking patience—largely because of electoral pressures—and often disregarded their economic advice when it conflicted with short-term political gain.

Americans’ general understanding of economics, as well as the media’s, is also criticized during rounds of interviews. Harvey Rosen, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under George W. Bush, remarked bluntly:

The media are awful…. For the most part, they don’t understand economics. Secondly, they think that because you are in the administration, you must be lying to them.

Lament over the lack of economic literacy among media and the general public pervades the book. However, most economists outlined a series of steps and recommendations that could advance collective economic knowledge. Whether it’s educating Americans or convincing politicians, economists face an uphill battle on many fronts.

Differences magnified / There are occasional differences among the interviewees, from their take on supply-side economics to their opinions on federal spending and income support. The outlier interview was of supply-sider Art Laffer, chief economist at the Office of Management and Budget under Nixon and economic adviser to Ronald Reagan. Laffer was especially candid in his interview. On Nixon, he was less than flattering:

Everything he did in economics was the opposite of what should be done! He raised taxes, he put on wage and price controls, he put on tariffs, he put on a buy-American program, and he went off gold when he should have stayed on it.”

Readers can see the parallels to today’s economic environment.

What stands out most from Laffer’s interview is his contempt for former colleagues and critics. Herb Stein, Paul Samuelson, Greenspan, Martin Feldstein, David Stockman, and Washington, DC itself are scorned. Even Milton Friedman isn’t entirely spared: “Milton was the Yoda of economics. He’d always talk about principles, but he didn’t write bills and work on the floor.” Despite Laffer’s successes during the Reagan administration, including the lowering of the top individual tax rate from 50% to 28%, the reader gets the impression that—like O’Neill—Laffer despised his time in D.C., even though he still influences domestic policy decades later.

The book includes, of course, a retelling of the story of the infamous cocktail napkin that produced the “Laffer Curve.” However, Laffer downplays his “invention,” saying it is an insight from generations past, from thinkers as varied as 14th-century philosopher Ibn Khaldun and John Maynard Keynes. The curve was largely forgotten after World War II until Laffer and Reagan popularized it; it has motivated much of the Republican Party’s fiscal thinking ever since.

Having a plan / Moving past Laffer, one takeaway from the book is especially relevant to the recent Democratic presidential race: the value of politicians having detailed policy proposals for all sorts of issues. Some of the advisers believed such plans are a necessity; to quote Gene Sperling, director of the National Economic Council under Clinton, a “plan beats no plan.” This idea was embodied in Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s erstwhile presidential campaign, which had the slogan, “I’ve got a plan for that.” Her campaign was easily the most policy-detailed of any of the 2020 candidates. Even if you disagreed with her ideas, at least you knew where she stood on the major issues. However, when it came to vote totals, all those plans usually left her in the middle of the pack.

On the other hand, many Republicans in recent elections seem to be running on the strategy that having a plan is a disadvantage. It’s unclear whether voters agree. If nature abhors a vacuum, then so does public policy—especially in times of crisis. When Democrats were in power during the Obama administration, they filled perceived gaps in health care and climate policy. Arguably, the GOP response has been little more than to undo them, with no alternative policy prescription, and the electorate seems to be increasingly underwhelmed by that response. While it’s inconclusive how much voters punished Republicans for lacking a climate change policy in 2018, it’s more than clear that GOP votes to repeal “Obamacare” without a viable alternative hurt Republicans in dozens of races. Health care was easily the most messaged campaign issue in the midterms.

To Sperling’s point, the Republican nihilist strategy can be politically effective if the status quo is unpopular, but saying “no” in the face of a popular policy program—or at least on an issue of public concern—is often a strategy for electoral defeat. This fall, we will see if Republicans think they can win by continuing to say “no,” or if they will try a different strategy.

Lessons from the Great Recession / Scholars of the 2008 financial crisis will appreciate the book’s disparate takes on policymaking in the crisis. Whether the blame for the crisis should go to the Fed, or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, or the lack of regulation around derivatives and the mortgage industry, there are plenty of opinions to consider.

When Larry Summers, treasury secretary under Clinton, was pressed on whether reforming the Depression-era Glass–Steagall banking act contributed to the Great Recession, he shot back, “I don’t think it’s remotely plausible to argue that the Gramm–Leach–Bliley legislation, which President Clinton signed into law and we worked on, contributed meaningfully to the financial crisis.” Likewise, the late Alan Krueger, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under Obama, put the Great Recession in grim context: “The economy was contracting at an 8 percent annual rate, and we were losing 800,000 jobs a month.”

Sadly, those numbers seem quaint compared to our current contraction. Bowmaker did interview Kevin Hassett, who chaired the Council of Economic Advisers under Trump, and Mick Mulvaney, who headed Trump’s OMB. Bowmaker may want to write a follow-up on their thoughts on what is now arguably the most dramatic contraction in American history.

Conclusion / The book gives readers an appreciation of the awesome task economists face when trying to influence economic policy in the United States, and the utter disappointment they must feel when their views are overruled by political advisers. Despite the distinguished academic backgrounds and professional bona fides of the interviewees, it’s easy to forget they are also human. The book illustrates that frequently, as saying “no” to the president can be difficult.