Tyler Cowen: evaluation

Transcript context

…You’re closer to DC than me. I don’t know where to start with that. [laughter] I would just say, in my basic view of politics, the main problem usually is the voters. Not always, but typically, it’s the voters. We started talking about this before in the green room. I think senators, as a whole, are actually fairly impressive. It doesn’t mean I agree with what they do or say or changes they push for, but just as raw studies in talent, they seem to me pretty good. I live right outside of Washington, DC. I know, or have met, really very large numbers of people in politics: chiefs of staff, military agencies, people on the board of the Fed. I think our talent in those slots is pretty good. Not perfect, but that is not our national problem, in my opinion, at all. I can name plenty of individual politicians who I think are just absolute train wrecks, but again, I would think in terms of the main problem being the voter. I think our political system does better at bringing in some talent than you would think. It’s striking to me, if you live in the DC area, how many families, almost every family — there’s some notion of doing national service that I actually find strikingly absent in the Bay Area. Maybe in the whole US, it’s weakest here and strongest where I live, but that sense of obligation to national service — it actually works, I think. US government still has done a whole bunch of things properly. We did Operation Warp Speed. That would be one example. We had a lot of talent there. The economist heading it, Michael Kremer, Nobel laureate, one of the very best economists alive on planet Earth, and he was running that side of Operation Warp Speed. Well, how’d that happen? We’re doing something right. But at the end of the day, the voting inputs — I don’t know. I really do worry. But Daniel? That’s going to be a much better answer than the one I can give you.…

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