In nearly 50 years of @Harvard affiliation, I have never been as disillusioned and alienated as I am today.
Lawrence H. Summers
8,787 posts
Lawrence H. Summers
@LHSummers
Charles W. Eliot University Professor and President Emeritus at Harvard. Secretary of the Treasury for President Clinton and Director of NEC for President Obama
- Aside from the general issues about Trump‘s tariff and his economic nationalism strategy, today’s actions against Canada and Mexico are inexplicable and dangerous. 1/8
- Never before has an hour of Presidential rhetoric cost so many people so much. Markets continue to move after my previous tweet. The best estimate of the loss from tariff policy is now is closer to $30 trillion or $300,000 per family of four.
- It’s now clear that the @realDonaldTrump Administration computed reciprocal tariffs without using tariff data. This is to economics what creationism is to biology, astrology is to astronomy, or RFK thought is to vaccine science. The Trump tariff policy makes little sense EVEN if
- Replying to @LHSummersThe silence from Harvard’s leadership, so far, coupled with a vocal and widely reported student groups' statement blaming Israel solely, has allowed Harvard to appear at best neutral towards acts of terror against the Jewish state of Israel.
- If during the Clinton or Obama Administrations there had been a statement from @POTUS or anyone senior official in the morning before the Employment Report it would have been a major scandal—with all sorts of investigations following on.
- I think @JeffBezos is mostly wrong in his recent attack on the @JoeBiden Admin. It is perfectly reasonable to believe, as I do and @POTUS asserts, that we should raise taxes to reduce demand to contain inflation and that the increases should be as progressive as possible.
- I’m not sure understand the argument for a windfall profits tax on energy companies. If you reduce profitability, you will discourage investment which is the opposite of our objective.
- I could have never conceived that the U.S. President would be far more aggressive against a great university than he would be against a Russian dictator engaged in invading a U.S. ally. Why is it smart to starve cancer research, students on financial aid, innovation in public
- Developments in the last 24 hours suggest we may be headed for serious financial crisis wholly induced by US government tariff policy.
- The just announced tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum are the worst trade policy yet. Increasing the price of key inputs for the US manufacturing industries--who employ 10 million people--is what a U.S. adversary would do. It is a self-inflicted wound to the U.S. economy
- I am profoundly saddened and alarmed by @Columbia University and @PaulWeissLLP law firm's capitulation to the increasingly dictatorial Trump administration.
- The delayed @Harvard leadership statement fails to meet the needs of the moment. Why can’t we find anything approaching the moral clarity of Harvard statements after George Floyd's death or Russia's invasion of Ukraine when terrorists kill, rape and take hostage hundreds of“We write to you today heartbroken by the death and destruction unleashed by the attack by Hamas that targeted citizens in Israel this weekend, and by the war in Israel and Gaza now under way.” Read the full statement from University leadership. hrvd.me/MiddleEast237t
