The Right Books

Bruce Bartlett and Timothy P. Roth have edited a volume, The Supply-Side Solution (Chatham House, Box One, Chatham, N.J. 07928; $12.95), that tries “to give the reader not only a general understanding of what supplyside economics is all about but an introduction to some of the technical issues and current research on the subject as well.” Its 16 articles, by as many economists, accomplish the task admirably, conveying in the process the impression that supply-side theory, like whisky, improves with age. Arthur Laffer’s cocktail napkin and the Kemp-Roth bill were pretty raw stuff; the ideas behind them have not been abandoned, but they have been tempered somewhat by a welcome skepticism. If one can judge by this volume, supply-siders are no longer promising—or anyway hinting—that the cornucopic society is around the corner for the taking.

At the risk of imputing my own opinions to these 16 economists, I summarize my understanding of their work by saying that the consensus appears today to be that supply-side theory is less a prescription for rebuilding the U.S. economy than it is a description of a productive economy in the very pink of condition. Supply-side economics is always set up against Keynesian economics as if the two were genuine alternatives to each other, and yet it seems evident today that Keynesianism is not economics at all, but a political substitute for economics.

CW

About the Author

Chilton Williamson Jr.

Bruce Bartlett and Timothy P. Roth have edited a volume, The Supply-Side Solution (Chatham House, Box One, Chatham, N.J. 07928; $12.95), that tries “to give the reader not only a general understanding of what supplyside economics is all about but an introduction to some of the technical issues and current research on the subject as well.” Its 16 articles, by as many economists, accomplish the task admirably, conveying in the process the impression that supply-side theory, like whisky, improves with age. Arthur Laffer’s cocktail napkin and the Kemp-Roth bill were pretty raw stuff; the ideas behind them have not been abandoned, but they have been tempered somewhat by a welcome skepticism. If one can judge by this volume, supply-siders are no longer promising—or anyway hinting—that the cornucopic society is around the corner for the taking.

At the risk of imputing my own opinions to these 16 economists, I summarize my understanding of their work by saying that the consensus appears today to be that supply-side theory is less a prescription for rebuilding the U.S. economy than it is a description of a productive economy in the very pink of condition. Supply-side economics is always set up against Keynesian economics as if the two were genuine alternatives to each other, and yet it seems evident today that Keynesianism is not economics at all, but a political substitute for economics.