lecture on economic policy

I attended Professor Meltzer’s lecture entitled “Lessons about economic policy from history.” Professor Meltzer has been a professor at Carnegie Mellon University for 53 years and his lecture was about the three volumes that he had written about the Federal Reserve and its role over the last 100 years.

The first part of the lecture was about why the Federal Reserve started. Previously, there had been no argument among the political parties in power that a central bank should exist but the real question was who would run it? The Federal Reserve (or Fed) was founded in 1917 by an act of Congress to act as an independent entity. However it wasn’t until 1935, when the regulations on the Fed were revised, that the bank was created as we know it today and then it wasn’t till 1951 that it made its presence known on a large scale. Initially, the agreement was that the Fed was free to raise interest rates and help finance government debt; however, it was not its job to advise Congress on any policies. This plan worked until President Johnson ran up the debt with his Great Society. Once the inflation that resulted from all the programs from the Great Society began, it became hard to stop it. Soon the major goal of the Fed became to keep high stability and high employment, which can’t really be done since with high employment comes high inflation. The public assumed that price instability was the only way to keep employment. As the government spent more money to help keep employment high, the Fed financed the debt by increasing its share of government securities. The debt became mainly financed by Japan and currently China. President Reagan had once said that “Deficits don’t matter” and professor Meltzer finished that phrase with “…as long as foreigners finance them.”

The second part of the lecture was about inflation. President Johnson didn’t care about inflation and President Nixon increased interest rates which was unusual for a nation during peacetime. For Nixon, the most important thing was to prevent unemployment. He blamed losing the 1960 election on the fact that there had been a recession during that time that had been orchestrated by the Fed (President Eisenhower was a firm believer in fiscal responsibility). During Nixon’s second election, he told Chairman Burns (who was also a personal friend of his) to “inflate” the economy to ensure that Nixon won. And then when President Cather came into office he also wanted inflation even though he had never before shown an inclination towards it. This change of heart was because the public had come to believe that inflation was the soundest economic policy. When this policy wasn’t enforced by the Chairman of the Fed (the bank is independent so the President has no power over it), some Democratic senators told Carter that he was following a “Republican” policy of unemployment and high interest rates. Thus Carter asked for credit controls, which he was allowed to do under the regulations. There was an immediate 10% interest rate decrease and it was the largest GDP decrease ever. Professor Meltzer claims that deflation hasn’t deterred growth and didn’t do any real harm, except for the deflation that was seen in the Great Depression.

Professor Meltzer then went on to state reasons why he feels why the current economic crisis occurred. In 1937, Fannie Mae was formed. Its main purpose was to buy and sell mortgagees to make them seem more like commodities and more debt. However, President Clinton wanted more low income people to own homes so he passed laws stating that people didn’t need a credit history or didn’t need to make a down payment in order to buy a house. So these people didn’t really have any assets other than their house. And the other point was about the phrase” too big to fail.” This term didn’t come into existence until the 1970’s when a large bank was about the fail and the government bailed it out stating that its collapse would cause too many negative ripples in the economy. After this, the world came to the agreement that banks had to hold more capital to cover losses. To bypass this, banks took the bad debt off the books and placed it into separate companies it hide it. Also, there isn’t an incentive for banks to play safe when Congress had a fund to bail banks out.

The current government is running high deficits. At this rate, by 2019 90% of this nation’s GDP will be deficit-paid.

Phipps

Attending Phipps today a new version of beauty entered my mind. I developed a new love for natural beauty and the creativity that mother nature has herself. Being able to create plants that resemble different animals and in different shapes and sizes defines beauty. I truly appreciate that I was able to visit Phipps to purely think and understand the message Zadie Smith was trying to send its readers. Being able to comprehend the concept of what true natural beauty is and how it should be appreciated and today I opened my eyes and saw it for the first time. Natural beauty is something that should be appreciated and understood.

Howard.

I hate Howard. Everything he does just makes him more and more into a sad, aging, confused, clueless man. He should be old enough to realize that it is not right to cheat on his wife with their mutual friend, let alone do it again with a girl who is the same age as his daughter. He should be old enough to realize that his wife is not the same woman that he married 30 years ago and that he must address the fact that the dynamic of their relationship changed. He should also, most importantly, be old enough to realize that mistakes cannot always be forgiven and things can't always work out the way he wants them to be just because he wishes it to be so.

However, his pathetic nature does spark a little sympathy for me. The final scene where the room melts away and Kiki is the only thing on his mind gives me hope that maybe, just maybe, he learned something from his mistakes and will be able to grow into the man and father and (maybe) husband that he should be. But the only part where this cluelessness breaks my heart is when he deals with his children. His love, however strange, is obviously there; he is fascinated with them as they continue to grow before his eyes, bewildered by the fact that they are independent, real people now that no longer need him for anything, except for the occasional twenty dollar bill. I feel like this sense of lost control could account for his inability to control his own actions. I love the passage where he wants to express some sort of intellectual knowledge to his son:

"He was having an odd paternal rush, a blood surge that was also about blood and was presently humming through Howard's expansive intelligence to find words that would more effectively express something like don't walk in front of cars take care and be good and dont hurt or be hurt and dont' live in a way that makes you feel dead and don't betray anybody or yourself and take care of what matters and please don't and please remember and make sure" "

This honestly really does make my heart break, because I wonder about my own parents and how they feel about the fact that I am growing up. I mean, I know it's a weird sensation for me to be able to go days at a time without talking to them, the fact that I went from being so reliant on them for everything, basically, to virtually being able to exist fully without them. I want Howard to know that even though this is true, his children love their weird, awkward British geeky dad. I feel like he doesn't know that, he sees their growing up as growing away from loving them and he is trying so hard to hold onto them, but he can't. I hope my parents know that they have taught me well, and in that, they have also taught me how to effectively love them. I wish Howard could have realized that in the novel, too.

Lecture on Evolutionary Psychology

I went to listen to Professor David Rakison talk about evolutionary psychology. I found it to be extraordinarily interesting and it got me really thinking of taking his class on the subject next spring. I thought that it was cool to see how our fears and actions are part of our genetic makeup and how we do things because of reasons from way back when. Going along with the theme of On Beauty, he touched on how skinny has not always been preferred. He also mapped out what men look for in women and what women look for in men. It was interesting that he discussed studies taken from around the world, in all sorts of cultures. No matter the living situation, many things are very similar in all places. I find it fascinating how everyday things like fears can be traced back to our birth. For example, he discussed how babies instinctively know that spiders are “scary” and they can actually pick out the shape of a spider. Many studies have proven the existence of evolutionary psychology and I would like to follow it as this become more well known.

More on Weight

“Why are there are no awards for the girl who starves herself through the Christmas period – refusing all sweetmeats, roasts and liqueurs offered to her – so that she might appear at the January formal in a backless dress and toeless shoes, although the temperature is near to freezing and the snow is heavy upon the ground? Howard, who wore a floor-length overcoat, gloves, leather shoes and a thick college scarf, stood by Emerson’s front gate and watched with real awe the mist of white flakes falling upon bare shoulders and hands, the clothed men holding their near-naked, decorative partners as together they stepped around puddles and snowdrifts like ballroom dancers on an assault course. They all looked like princesses – but what steel must lurk within!” – page 341

I really like this quote for many reasons. I think that it speaks to the idea that women put so much effort into looking good, even if just for one night. The fact that girls “starve” themselves to look like a princess is really saddening to me. I have always been the kind of girl to go against the norm because I like being my own person. This is not to say that I haven’t wanted to look like a princess for a special occasion, but I do not do it for the same reason as described here. These girls are so caught up on society’s interpretation of what is beautiful, not what makes them feel beauty. I think that everyone can find happiness in themselves with some confidence and people that they can count on, but I feel like many young girls these days do not have that. With the help of media, it is “common knowledge” that skinny is beautiful. I always like to see a television show, such as America’s Next Top Model, which tells young girls that it is alright to be something other than skinny. The show monitors the weight of the models to make sure that they are healthy and they even have overweight models which is refreshing.

Skinny is Beautiful?

I fell that people, especially people in modern day society, value body figure and looks extensively. People judge whether or not a person is beautiful base on his or her body figure and look. Today, people emphases more and more on being skinny and how being skinny is beautiful. But I think in On Beauty, Zaddie Smith is trying to suggest that being skinny is actually not as beautiful as what people might think. She also tries to suggest that beauty comes from a inner self rather than from your figure. Okay, first of all, being skinny is not beautiful. In the novel when Jerome and Kiki are in Levi's room, they find pictures of African American women with no clothes or little clothes on. These women have figures rather than being skinning, and Kiki makes a remark saying that at least they have meat. This almost shows that Zaddie Smith is criticizing society for emphasizing on the idea of being skinny. These women, although they are not skinny, they are still perceived to be "pornography" worthy. Although this is extremely degrading but it nevertheless reveals these women's beauties. Then Zaddie Smith is also trying to suggest that beauty comes from the innerself. At the end of the noel. Howard had finally see beauty in Kiki although she might be overweight and old. Compares to Claire and Victoria Kiki is what a society will consider to be less attractive but she is the true beauty Smith protrays. Kiki's beauty comes from her heart and her maturity. Victoria, who might be beautiful on the surface, is just a plastic and is superficial. In the novel, Victoria's personality is extremely ugly in comparison to Kiki's or even Zora's. She is immature and she wants attention. I also want to comment on her "relationship" with Howard. I just want to say that I am grossed out by the two, and it causes me to be extremely repulsive. I almost want to stop reading because of the relationship between the two. I feel bad for Carl and worse for Jerome. When he wanted to marry her at the beginning of the noel, I thought she is a decent girl, but now, i hate her.

I'm all over the place, here.

As I was finishing On Beauty, I was really surprised by how much action there was, especially towards the very end of the novel. When Kiki finds the painting under Levi's bed and begins interrogating him, I actually stopped reading and looked to see how much of the book was left; I was so surprised that, instead of the novel progressively wrapping up, so many more things happened.

I also found myself very conflicted towards the end as to whether I was routing for or against Howard and Kiki getting back together/resuming their relationship. Through most of the book, I think, I thought they should and generally wanted them to continue their relationship. Mistakes do happen, and in 30 years for Howard to have an affair for about 3 weeks, then completely terminate the relationship... it really doesn't seem that bad. I figured Howard was stupid, that he realized that he had risked losing his family and the woman who has supported him and been his best friend for over 30 years, and that he would have learned from this mistake. Not so, apparently. When Howard had sex with Vee, I absolutely could not believe how pathetic he was. I couldn't believe it was happening at all, really. I lost all possible respect I could have had for him and no longer wished for Kiki to forgive him.

But I also had a fairly strong reaction to Victoria Kipps, too. She had been flirty (whether intentional or unintentional had not been disclosed) throughout the novel, with Howard and just in general, really. I found her pathetic as well in the sex scene. It was also very evident just how naive she is. Everything she does--what she says, does, sounds she makes, etc,--all seem straight from a bad porno movie or something; this includes how she sends dirty pictures or herself to Howard (and also to Carl), and that she shows up to the hotel with Howard (obviously to have sex) in a ridiculous outfit consisting of corset, stockings, G-string, and garters. Who does that??? No one does that except in movies and in pornography. When she storms into Howard's office, though, I thought there was some hope. She says, "'I know you think,' she said, each word tear-inflected, making her hard to understand, 'that you ... know me. You don't know me. This,' she said and touched her face, her breasts, her hips, 'that's what you know. but you don't know me. And you were the one who wanted this-- that's all anybody ever...' She touched the same three placed. 'And so that's what I...'" (390). Besides sounding like an extremely angsty, dramatic teenager, I thought she had realized something big, something important: that because she is always so flirty and uses her looks so purposefully, people only want her for her looks, for her body-nothing more. Unfortunately, though, she goes on to send dirty emails to Carl and continues the same routine with him and thus perpetuates her vain, shallow cycle. She needs to be wanted, but even more than that, she needs to be had for some reason. At least Carl was closer to her age, I guess? Other than that, there really seems to be no bright side.

Also, on a completely random note, I loved the scene where Howard 'catches' (sees) Kiki attending one of Monty's lectures and immediately races home to wait for her, forcibly petting their dog Murdoch in an empty room in their empty house like some kind of crazed, deranged psychopath (like the bad guy in a bad movie), plotting, contemplating the confrontation.
"He went straight home and awaited his wife. In his rage, he sat on the couch holding Murdoch tightly on his lap, scheming upon the many ways he might open the coming conversation... It was all he could do not to leap from his seat and confront her in the most vulgar way. he listened to her footsteps. She passed the doorways of the living room ('Hey. You OK?') and kept walking. Howard internally combusted.
'Been at work?'
Kiki retraced her steps and stopped in the doorway. She was-like all long-married people- immediately alerted to trouble by a tone of voice.
'No... Afternoon off.'
'Have a nice time?'
Kiki stepped into the room. 'Howard, what's the problem here?'
'I think,' said Howard, releasing Murdoch, who had grown tired of being partially strangled, 'I would have been marginally- marginally- less surprised to see you at a meeting of...'
Here they began to speak at the same time.
'Howard, what is this? Oh, God-'
'...of the Klu Klux fucking Klan- no, actually, that would have made a bit more-'" (392).

And so their argument commences in full force. I really admire Smith's ability to use humor in the novel, even at seemingly inappropriate places. I found the beginning of the scene hilarious, but I also admire Smith's ability to transition from humor to serious content, as she does with the funny setup, then very serious fight, ending in Kiki collapsing in the couch, weeping. The whole scene ends with them having sex, which is a very interesting transition in and of itself.
Overall, I think the book was very well written, I enjoyed the humor as well as the beauty of some of the more serious passages, and I just really liked the book in general.