Weekend update: February 13. By Matthew Yglesias

Weekend update: February 13. By Matthew Yglesias

February 13, 2021

SlowBoring.com

Hot takes, super fast

Programming note: We’ve got so many great takes cooking up in the Slow Boring kitchen that we’ll be maintaining the standard M-F publishing schedule next week notwithstanding the sacred President’s Day holiday.

Speaking of which, I do this take every year so why not do it again — President’s Day is stupid, but also extremely close to the Super Bowl. And when there isn’t a pandemic, Super Bowl Sunday is a great time to get together with friends, drink beer, stay up late, and otherwise have a good time. Except then you have to go to work the next day. The obvious solution is to either move President’s Day back one week to coincide with the Super Bowl or else officially proclaim a Super Bowl Monday holiday.

Use, mention, and taboo

I kind of feel like Donald McNeil got a raw deal from The New York Times in that it’s odd to force a reporter out for conduct that doesn’t really seem to have violated any policy that was clearly stated in advance.

But I actually have more to say on the anti-McNeil side of the argument, where I think a lot of his defenders are making a mistake by claiming that he is fully exonerated by a hard-and-fast distinction between saying a certain racial slur and merely quoting it. In philosophy, we call this “the use/mention distinction.” You can use my name by saying “hey, Matt what’s up?” Or you can mention by name by saying “hey, is your name ‘Matt’?”

These are different things and we have quotation marks and everything to make the distinction. But I was taught use/mention in college by Kwame Appiah who noted at the time that there is a separate issue of taboo.

There’s a difference between a TV news anchor saying “fuck” and the air and a TV news anchor saying “and then the guy said ‘fuck.’” But the fact of the matter is that the FCC is going to fine you either way. As you can see in this piece, at The Washington Post, the rule is that you can mention “fuck” in the body of a story but not in a headline. I’m not sure that I could give an elaborate rational defense of why certain words are taboo and others aren’t. But the word McNeil mentioned is taboo, and mentioning it is clearly a violation of that taboo. And while taboos are all a bit odd, the view that mentioning a taboo word is a form of violation is perfectly normal and in place with all kinds of swears.

Kathryn Garcia is good

Courtesy of the Garcia for NYC Mayor Campaign

Andrew Yang is leading the polls for New York City Mayor and I think he is an okay choice. But if you look at the candidates’ policy platforms, former Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia is clearly the best in the field.

If you know me, you know I love housing, and so does Garcia — she promises to “comprehensively zone for more affordable housing citywide, focusing on neighborhoods rich in transit, jobs, and schools,” along with a bunch of specifics including ending apartment bans, legalizing basement apartments, legalizing SROs, and other good stuff. But she’s not a single-issue housing candidate; her transportation platform also includes nerdy goodness like fare integration across modes and dedicated bus lanes. Phonics-focused reading instruction! There’s tons of good stuff here.

Right now Garcia is stuck in a kind of low-name-recognition bubble where she’s low in the polls, so she doesn’t get coverage, so nobody knows she exists, so she stays low in the polls. But if you live in New York, consider telling a pollster you’ll vote for her. If you’re enthusiastic about urban reform, consider throwing her a little money and maybe getting a story about her fundraising written. Post something on Facebook or Twitter or forward this note to a friend. The low name ID trap is very real but also very escapable, and I think it’d be huge for east coast housing politics for someone like this to get buzz.

Biden’s Fed vacancy

There was a report Wednesday that Lisa Cook, a former Obama CEA member, is under consideration for the open seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. Then on Thursday, it was reported that Bill Spriggs, the AFL-CIO’s chief economist, is also getting a look.

I’m told by people familiar with the process that these reports are accurate but that it’s a “long list,” so you shouldn’t think of it as just Cook or Spriggs.

These are both great choices. Spriggs has more of a public profile on monetary issues, which you could see as a point in his favor or against him depending on how you look at it. Two other names I like are Julia Coronado and Narayana Kocherlakota.

Mostly, though, I think Biden should fill the vacancy quickly. Jay Powell is doing great, but if the economy reflates, he’s going to quickly start facing pressure from hawkish regional bank presidents (and probably Republicans in Congress), and having a full employment fanatic in there to anchor the other side is going to be very helpful.

Too fast, not too big

After a few more conversations, I’d like to restate more clearly a critique of the stimulus plan as it seems to be coming together in Congress — it’s not that $1.9 trillion is too much to spend, but that if you’ve got $1.9 trillion to work with, you should probably spread some of it out over a multi-year period.

For example, Democrats look set to create a refundable Child Tax Credit that will cut child poverty in half, but it only lasts for one year. Obviously they’ll fight to extend it down the road. But why not make that a two-year CTC boost and make fighting for its renewal a midterm issue?

My big picture proposal would be:

Cut out the state aid — why cut a huge check to Brian Kemp that he can use to cut taxes next while running for reelection against Stacy Abrams?

Use the extra money to make the CTC boost last longer, do another round of stimulus checks in 2022, and if there’s money left over, use it for 2022 ACA subsidies or SNAP benefits.

Instead of increasing UI benefits by $400/month through September, make it a two-month bump and then scale it down to a $100 increase.

The point is that it’s good to legislate fast, but you don’t need to front-load the spending so much. In particular, parking a ton of cash with mostly GOP-controlled state legislatures to be doled out at their discretion seems much worse than Democrats charting out a multi-year expenditure program.

Housing and marriage

Here’s a fun empirical finding — housing scarcity helps generate the class divide in marriage rates.