Some private-sector economists who’ve generally supported Trump’s efforts to accelerate growth with lower taxes, less regulation and fairer trade deals were nonplussed by the selection of Moore, an official at the conservative Heritage Foundation think-tank and an economic adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“The fact that Stephen Moore gets nominated and has a plausible path to confirmation but Peter Diamond didn’t is truly detestable,” said Neil Dutta, head of economics at Renaissance Macro Research. He was referring to Diamond, a Nobel Prize-winning economist whom President Barack Obama nominated to the Fed but ended up withdrawing from consideration in June 2011 in the face of Republican opposition.
“The upshot is that Stephen Moore will not have much influence if he sat around the table,” Dutta said.
While most presidential nominees keep a low public profile until they’re considered by the Senate, out of respect for the democratic process, Moore took to the airwaves hours after Trump announced his nomination two days ago. In a Bloomberg Television interview he called the Fed’s December rate increase, which was approved in a unanimous vote, “a very substantial mistake.”
.. The difference is they’re all respected Ph.D. economists, so concerns about politicizing the Fed didn’t become a much of a factor in their Senate confirmation hearings.
Moore, who has a master of arts in economics from George Mason University in Virginia, is better known for helping promote a fiscal agenda than he is for monetary-policy expertise. He co-wrote, with Laffer, a 2018 book on Trump’s economic strategy entitled “Trumponomics: Inside the America First Plan to Revive Our Economy.”
He also formerly wrote on the economy and public policy for the Wall Street Journal and is on his second stint at the Heritage Foundation.