Anyone who's heard or read any news stories about inflation in the past few months can't escape the pair of Delphic oracles, Larry Summers and Jason Furman. Summers is the former president of Harvard who once speculated that genetic differences may cause women to have a harder time competing for math and science jobs. Before that, he served as Bill Clinton's Treasury secretary, and after that as director of the National Economic Council under Barack Obama. Furman, a Harvard economics professor, was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under Obama — after previously serving as Summers' deputy at the NEC. Both of them have been permanent fixtures on cable news of late as resident doomsayers, acting as a Greek chorus urging the Federal Reserve to keep on raising interest rates, regardless of the impact tighter money will have on jobless rates and American families.
Furman has speculated that Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan should have been smaller, and may have contributed to higher prices. Summers frets about a looming "wage-price spiral" caused by workers gaining some traction in a tight labor market. (Yes, you read that right: He's concerned that wages may go up.)
