Summers in SandersWhen the members of the Harvard presidential search committee anointed former treasury secretary and world-renowned economist Larry Summers for the Harvard throne, they may not have realized the impact the decision could have for first-years in the College.
The day after the appointment was officially announced at Loeb House, the NASDAQ plunged 6 percent, and Wall Street had its first bear market of the millennium. The faltering economy is a problem for President George W. Bush, who was noted during the presidential debates for his insistence that critics of his tax plan were using "fuzzy math." If government revenues dry up, Bush may have to backtrack on his huge tax cut proposal.
Incidentally, Bush was elected by scarcely more voters in Florida than there were members of the Harvard Board of Overseers who met Sunday on the 64th floor of the GE building in Manhattan to vote unanimously for Summers. This slim mandate means a soured economy, and no tax cuts may prompt voters to turn against Bush in the polls for his inability to stop the market slide. Perhaps he'll call on Baker Professor of Economics Martin S. Feldstein, another world-renowned economist who, like Summers, used to work in government but has since returned to the Academy. If Feldstein were to leave for Washington, there would be an opening for a new instructor for Social Analysis 10: Principles of Economics, lovingly called Ec 10 by the hoards of prospective economics concentrators who crowd into the lectures in Sanders Theater. It's an opening that could be filled by few more qualified economists than our president-elect himself.
If for some reason, Feldstein cannot continue, Summers should consider teaching Ec 10. It would give him needed insight into the sobering reality of the large, impersonal lecture class that is the hallmark of most students' first few years in the College. And it would allow him to interact with undergraduates in ways that President Neil L. Rudenstine rarely does.
But what if the plunging markets erode the endowment and force Summers to start intensive fundraising? Would he have to forsake his teaching duties? Probably not. Harvard and the possible Ec 10 students would know they were in good hands. Summers does, after all, have experience making money.
--Jonathan H. Esensten
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