Simon Johnson: belief

Transcript context

…I’m a big fan of your book, Jump-Starting America, about science and science policy. It’s with Jonathan Gruber. I have a few questions about science policy. You argue for a place-based policy to jump-start different regions in America. I suppose I’m worried in the same way that you’re worried about northern England, that we could do a lot of good things, which I would be in favor of, but most of the gains will go to the coasts. Since you wrote the book, we’ve had mRNA vaccines. Well, Moderna — that’s in the Boston-Cambridge area; Open AI — that’s in San Francisco. Those are phenomenal developments, but they’re not in Rochester. They’re not in Iowa. Are you now more despairing of our ability to use place-based policies to jump-start these other regions? No, actually, we’ve gone the other way. We’re a bit more encouraged, Tyler. You’re right, of course, about those big breakthroughs, and we are all about the breakthroughs there. But one of the things that strikes me as being a strength of the US is the depth of the bench. All these other places where real estate prices are not so high — there are plenty of talented people who want to live there. Of course, there are massive spillover effects from investing in basic science, which is the basis of our argument. When we make those public-sector investments — that’s to get the spillovers — why not look more broadly outside of Boston, outside of New York, outside of San Francisco or Seattle, and attempt to make those places more central, tap into the talent that already exists in those places? I think the shrinking of distance, or a different view of distance, Tyler, after the pandemic, has got to be a helpful part of that. Reading the book, much as I like many parts of it, I feel you’re underrating the benefits of sunshine. When you list your most promising places for regeneration, the top three on the list are Rochester, Pittsburgh, and the Syracuse area. Now, Pittsburgh may be doing okay, but Rochester is still losing population. Syracuse area not doing so well. The entire southeast — not the entire, but most of the southeast — has done well. Nashville — a star performer, not on the list. Most of Texas, doing well. What if we just had a simpler theory that said it’s sunbelt, and a good university helps. Isn’t that a better predictor for the up-and-coming places than like Rochester, Pittsburgh, Syracuse? Cleveland is on your list. Ithaca, New York; Cincinnati — they’re all in your top 10. They don’t seem like winners to me.…

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