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Lots of people want to hear what a Fed Chairman has to say and it is impossible to disentangle their future work from that former position. Is a position as a

Lots of people want to hear what a Fed Chairman has to say and it is impossible to disentangle their future work from that former position. Is a position as a lecture of Economics at Harvard considering working for personal profit? Writing books on subjects that they are experts in? How about writing for the NYTimes? Appearing on TV? What about if they did all those things before taking a government job? If your answer is yes to those things, then taking a high-level government position becomes impossible for anyone working class. Since you believe that the position bars them from any worthwhile future employment, they have to be independently wealthy before entering government service. I personally enjoy reading the works of Ben Bernanke and think that he should be allowed to continue his work in economics despite having held a top position at the federal government. He's intelligent, insightful, and a good teacher.

treis 6y ago
>Is a position as a lecture of Economics at Harvard Before I answer, are you seriously arguing that taking a job as a professor is the same as getting paid 1 million dollars for ~10 hours of work?
- mywittyname 6y ago
  If they were given the job because of their position in the government, why does it matter if the job is as a professor, author, talking head, or executive? It's all "profiting from the position." The debate seems to be over the price. $700k / yr from lecturing to hedge funds is bad but $150k / yr to do the same at Harvard is good?
  - treis 6y ago
    (1) She is qualified to be a professor at Harvard even if you exclude her work in public service. (2) Her salary is in line with others in her position and is given in exchange for doing actual work. (3) Harvard is not in a position to directly profit from potentially privileged information leaking out in her lectures to students (4) Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit from Yellen influencing current government regulators/policy makers (5) Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit from Yellen taking a subsequent regulatory/policy position in government
    - ModernMech 6y ago
      > Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit/profit... They don't? Harvard's $40 billion endowment is larger than Citadel's assets managed. Harvard is a hedge fund that does education as a side hustle.

treis 6y ago

>Is a position as a lecture of Economics at Harvard Before I answer, are you seriously arguing that taking a job as a professor is the same as getting paid 1 million dollars for ~10 hours of work?

mywittyname 6y ago
If they were given the job because of their position in the government, why does it matter if the job is as a professor, author, talking head, or executive? It's all "profiting from the position." The debate seems to be over the price. $700k / yr from lecturing to hedge funds is bad but $150k / yr to do the same at Harvard is good?
- treis 6y ago
  (1) She is qualified to be a professor at Harvard even if you exclude her work in public service. (2) Her salary is in line with others in her position and is given in exchange for doing actual work. (3) Harvard is not in a position to directly profit from potentially privileged information leaking out in her lectures to students (4) Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit from Yellen influencing current government regulators/policy makers (5) Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit from Yellen taking a subsequent regulatory/policy position in government
  - ModernMech 6y ago
    > Harvard is not in a position to directly benefit/profit... They don't? Harvard's $40 billion endowment is larger than Citadel's assets managed. Harvard is a hedge fund that does education as a side hustle.