Ralph Nader Mansplains Monetary Policy to Janet Yellen
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/11/nader-mansplains-monetary-policy-to-yellen.html
It has been hard having a woman lead the world's most powerful economic institution, the Federal Reserve. Federal Open Market Committee meetings have become giant cryfests, punctuated by breaks for emotional overeating. Interest-rate setting has started to align with the lunar cycle. Worst, Janet Yellen, with her small lady brain, has failed to grok that low interest rates harm savers. She'd better sit down with her husband so he can explain that to her!
That last bit — astonishingly, or maybe not so astonishingly — is a real-life, actual suggestion being made by Ralph Nader, who dings Yellen for hurting seniors, not helping payday-loan borrowers, being in the pocket of the big banks, and for playing politics, all in one fantastically sexist opinion piece.
Chairwoman Yellen, I think you should sit down with your Nobel Prize winning husband, economist George Akerlof, who is known to be consumer-sensitive. Together, figure out what to do for tens of millions of Americans who, with more interest income, could stimulate the economy by spending toward the necessities of life.
For heaven's sake, you're a "liberal" from Berkeley! That is supposed to mean something other than to be indentured by the culture and jargon of the Federal Reserve. If you need further nudging on monetary and regulatory policies of the Fed, other than interest rate decisions, why not invite Berkeley Professor Robert Reich, one of your long-time friends and admirers, to lunch on your next trip home?
Readers will be stunned, STUNNED, to learn that (a) Janet Yellen's husband agrees with her on macroeconomic issues; (b) Robert Reich agrees with Yellen and disagrees with Nader on interest rates; and (c) Janet Yellen--the Chair of the Fed--already has an understanding of how interest rates affect people and the economy, and doesn't need her husband to tell her what to think on the matter.
Being a sexist jackass doesn't mean you're right on economic policy, Ralphie.
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