Skip to main content
Menu

Main navigation

  • About
    • Annual Reports
    • Leadership
    • Jobs
    • Student Programs
    • Media Information
    • Store
    • Contact
    LOADING...
  • Experts
    • Policy Scholars
    • Adjunct Scholars
    • Fellows
  • Events
    • Upcoming
    • Past
    • Event FAQs
    • Sphere Summit
    LOADING...
  • Publications
    • Studies
    • Commentary
    • Books
    • Reviews and Journals
    • Public Filings
    LOADING...
  • Blog
  • Donate
    • Sponsorship Benefits
    • Ways to Give
    • Planned Giving

Issues

  • Constitution and Law
    • Constitutional Law
    • Criminal Justice
    • Free Speech and Civil Liberties
  • Economics
    • Banking and Finance
    • Monetary Policy
    • Regulation
    • Tax and Budget Policy
  • Politics and Society
    • Education
    • Government and Politics
    • Health Care
    • Poverty and Social Welfare
    • Technology and Privacy
  • International
    • Defense and Foreign Policy
    • Global Freedom
    • Immigration
    • Trade Policy
Live Now

Cato at Liberty


  • Blog Home
  • RSS

Email Signup

Sign up to have blog posts delivered straight to your inbox!

Topics
  • Banking and Finance
  • Constitutional Law
  • Criminal Justice
  • Defense and Foreign Policy
  • Education
  • Free Speech and Civil Liberties
  • Global Freedom
  • Government and Politics
  • Health Care
  • Immigration
  • Monetary Policy
  • Poverty and Social Welfare
  • Regulation
  • Tax and Budget Policy
  • Technology and Privacy
  • Trade Policy
Archives
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • February 2008
  • January 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007
  • July 2007
  • June 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • October 2006
  • September 2006
  • August 2006
  • July 2006
  • June 2006
  • May 2006
  • April 2006
  • Show More
May 12, 2017 5:05PM

Thank You Allan Meltzer

By Ian Vásquez

SHARE

Allan Meltzer passed away this week. He was one of the great economists I was lucky to have known and to have occasionally worked with. My colleague Jim Dorn wrote a very nice summary of his scholarship and influence here. Jim also recounts his close work with Cato over the years. Jerry O’Driscoll offers a remembrance here.

My own thinking on economic development benefitted substantially from Allan’s work on international debt, foreign aid, and financial crises. I benefitted even more from Allan’s guidance and interest in my work on those issues. He always took whatever time needed to discuss economic and policy topics with me, and recommend readings and research ideas. When Mexico experienced its 1994-95 peso crisis, Allan was an invaluable and generous resource. At the time, few market advocates in Washington criticized the proposed bailout of Mexico. The country, after all, had been considered a star reformer, and the government there was deemed worthy of U.S. support. We at Cato dissented and published a strong critique against “rescuing” Mexico because we thought it promoted moral hazard, it was a use of public resources that was unfair to ordinary Mexicans and Americans alike, and it supplanted and undermined superior market solutions to the crisis. From his perch at Carnegie Mellon University and the American Enterprise Institute, Allan was one of the few making the same arguments. It was useful to have him on our side and to employ some of the arguments he developed.

A few years later, when the Asian financial crisis erupted and the International Monetary Fund began bailing out not only countries in that region but also Russia, Argentina, and Brazil, the consensus finally started to shift. Allan was one of the more prominent voices in Washington critical of giving the IMF the capital increase it was requesting. The Congress finally did approve an increase, but as part of the deal, it set up a special bi-partisan congressional commission to look into the effectiveness of the leading international financial institutions. Allan headed up the group, which became known as the Meltzer Commission.

The commission’s final report received widespread attention and was influential. Among other things, it found a 55% to 60% failure rate of World Bank projects. As part of its proceedings, Allan asked me to provide an overview paper on the effectiveness of the IMF. (See my testimony here.) I was proud to have contributed analysis that made it into the final report and helped change the debate about IMF effectiveness and even the IMF’s own self-perception. Among my findings was that the IMF, set up to be a temporary lender to countries experiencing short-term economic problems, was in practice a long-term lender. Most countries that began borrowing from it did so for decades at a time—not a sign that it was fulfilling its stated role. My view of the IMF’s role during the Third World debt crisis was also revisionist. I provided evidence to support Anna Schwartz’s observation that official intervention “prolonged and worsened the debt problem.” And by then, experience itself was providing support for the view that massive bailouts were bad policy. Allan provided his moral and intellectual support to all of those arguments.

One time Allan invited Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan to AEI for a small meeting with top economists. He also invited me. Greenspan provided initial comments for about 25 minutes, after which I turned to Anna Schwartz, one of the world’s leading monetary economists who was sitting next to me, and I confessed that I really didn’t understand much of what he said. She looked at me calmly and said, “That’s alright, I didn’t understand him either.” As was my experience with Allan, I was lucky to have known and occasionally worked with Anna on many of the same issues. And as with Allan, Anna never made me feel academically inferior, though that was clearly the case. I could see why Allan and Anna were friends and colleagues.

Over the years, I would see Allan at meetings like the yearly Alamos Alliance gathering of Chicago-tradition economists in Mexico or Cato’s annual monetary conference. I almost always learned something from Allan, and it was always good to see him since he would typically be in good spirits.

The economics profession and those who knew him will miss him. Thank you Allan for being so generous.

Stay Connected to Cato

Sign up for the newsletter to receive periodic updates on Cato research, events, and publications.

View All Newsletters

1000 Massachusetts Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20001-5403
202-842-0200
Contact Us
Privacy

Footer 1

  • About
    • Annual Reports
    • Leadership
    • Jobs
    • Student Programs
    • Media Information
    • Store
    • Contact
  • Podcasts

Footer 2

  • Experts
    • Policy Scholars
    • Adjunct Scholars
    • Fellows
  • Events
    • Upcoming
    • Past
    • Event FAQs
    • Sphere Summit

Footer 3

  • Publications
    • Books
    • Cato Journal
    • Regulation
    • Cato Policy Report
    • Cato Supreme Court Review
    • Cato’s Letter
    • Human Freedom Index
    • Economic Freedom of the World
    • Cato Handbook for Policymakers

Footer 4

  • Blog
  • Donate
    • Sponsorship Benefits
    • Ways to Give
    • Planned Giving
Also from Cato Institute:
Libertarianism.org
|
Humanprogress.org
|
Downsizinggovernment.org