Policy Punchline

Jeffrey R. Shafer is the former Vice Chairman of Citi's Global Banking and Senior Asia Pacific Officer in New York where he was responsible for key Asia Pacific government and corporate client relationships.

From 1993 to 1997, Shafer was Assistant Secretary and subsequently Under Secretary of the U.S. Treasury for International Affairs. At the Treasury Department, he was responsible for international economic and financial issues, focusing on strengthening economic growth and financial stability in both developed and developing countries. Shafer was also responsible for the inter-agency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) process to review foreign investment in the United States. From 1984 until 1993, he held a series of high-level positions at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Prior to the OECD, he worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the Federal Reserve Board, and the Council of Economic Advisors.

Americans gave $410 billion in 2017, and the U.S. non-profit sector now totals to 11% of the total workforce and 6% of GDP. Philanthropy is such an important sector that is often overlooked by people, so we want to ask some important questions related to charity: What’s the trend in donations by common people today? Is the US charity space oversaturated? How can we distinguish effective non-profits from those that aren’t? How does one manage one’s philanthropic identity nowadays? …

In this episode, Allan Amico, founder of startup DonorUP and a young Princeton alum and entrepreneur, joins us discussing those important questions.

How does Germany’s health system operate? What lessons can the U.S. health system learn from it? Should refugees have European health care? Would Europe be able to support its increasingly older population?…

In this conversation, Prof. Reinhard Busse explains Germany’s complex yet well-functioning health system. He highlights how Americans can learn from a multi-payer system like Germany’s and what we could do to tackle the rising healthcare cost. His perspective from outside the U.S. might provide us some fresh insights on the various kinds of health systems in our world today and how the U.S. could learn from them.

Prof. Busse is the Director of the Department of Health Care Management at Technische Universität Berlin. He is Co-Director of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and editor-in-chief of the international peer-reviewed journal “Health Policy.” His research focuses on Health systems, Health Policy, Health Services, Health Economics, Epidemiology and Public Health.

What are some of the structural issues with big stock exchanges like NYSE and Nasdaq? What are some of the ways people could take advantage of them? IEX Group hopes to address those issues as an alternative to those traditional exchanges and as a fintech startup.

In this episode, our guest Mr. Laurence Latimer, who leads IEX Ventures, explains how stock exchanges work, what some of the existing problems in the financial services industry are, and what fintech innovators are discussing today among other topics.

Mr. Latimer leads IEX Ventures. IEX Group operates the Investors Exchange (IEX), a stock exchange for U.S. equities that is built for investors and companies. Prior to IEX, Mr. Latimer previously founded LGL Growth Consulting International and has worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company. He held various senior roles in venture-backed startups and has led growth initiatives and new market entry in the U.S., Asia, Latin America, and Sub-Saharan Africa.

What role did the SEC play in the past decade shaping up new financial regulations in the aftermath of the crisis? Is the agency capable of reinventing itself for change? What is the future for SEC regulations for the financial markets and institutions? How can we encourage more IPOs in our public markets? ...

In this episode, Mr. Norm Champ, former Director of Investment Management Division at SEC, discusses the inner workings of the SEC, the efficacy of financial regulations, the drawbacks of the Dodd-Frank Act, the importance of boosting the U.S. public markets, and his book "Going Public" among other topics.

While at the SEC, Mr. Champ played a key role in the SEC’s completion of landmark reforms in 2014 to strengthen the $3 trillion money market fund industry, and led important structural and policy changes in the Division of Investment Management. He was the leader of interactions with the Financial Stability Oversight Council as the Council turned its attention to whether asset management firms are “systemically important.” He also worked on crisis management efforts at securities firms to protect customers of those firms.

Mr. Champ also headed the creation of Guidance Updates and Senior Level Engagement initiatives, both of which were established to provide transparency to the industry about the priorities and goals of the SEC and to create a dialogue between policymakers and the senior management of asset management firms.

Mr. Champ's book "Going Public," which talks about his experiences at the SEC, is available on Amazon. For more information, please visit www.goingpublicthebook.com.

Do you ever think about what your Google searches say about you? What can data tell us about issues in our society like racism, depression, child abuse, and our deepest fears and insecurities? Many years after the emergence of the term “big data,” we truly need a fresh perspective to understand ourselves.

Seth Stephens-Davidowitz is here to answers those questions. Seth is the author of New York Times bestseller "Everybody Lies," which was published in 2017 and one of the Economist Magazine’s books of the year.

Seth has used Google searches to measure racism, self-induced abortion, depression, child abuse, hateful mobs, the science of humor, sexual preference, anxiety, son preference, and sexual insecurity, among many other topics. He has worked as a data scientist at Google and a visiting lecturer at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently a contributing op-ed writer for the New York Times.

Seth received his BA in philosophy, Phi Beta Kappa, from Stanford, and his PhD in economics from Harvard.

More so than for other countries, the management of water resources is an important aspect of public policy and politics. Today we’re going to try to identify some of the common themes of the relationship between water, politics, governance in contemporary China and the rest of the world.

Our guest for this episode is Dr. Scott Moore. He’s the Director of the Penn Global China Program at University of Pennsylvania. His first book, "Subnational Hydropolitics: Conflict, Cooperation, and Institution-Building in Shared River Basins," examines how climate change and other pressures affect the likelihood of conflict over water within countries. We’d like to especially thank Princeton’s Center on Contemporary China for sponsoring this episode and for connecting us with Dr. Moore.

Mr. Bill Dudley succeeded Tim Geithner as the New York Fed’s president in 2009 after the financial crisis. He has since then become a forceful advocate for cultural change at large financial institutions and argued for keeping a tight rein on banking activities. Mr. Dudley retired from the position after a 10-year term but still actively voices his opinions on the financial sector and will be teaching in Princeton this upcoming fall.

In this long conversation, Mr. Dudley talks about his early career after completing an economics Ph.D. in UC Berkeley, a mission-focusing approach to financial regulations, thoughts on the risks of recession and the next big crisis, and the toughest moment in his career among many other topics.

Mr. Dudley is certainly the most influential monetary policy maker to ever come on Policy Punchline, but he is so personable and friendly that Tiger called him “a chill guy” during the interview… Make sure you don’t miss out on this interview with this visionary policy maker.

A few punchlines?

Unlikely to have a recession soon. Banking sector is very healthy. Beware of cyber risks. Live a frugal life.

Official bio:

William C. Dudley became the 10th president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on January 27, 2009. In that capacity, he served as the vice chairman and a permanent member of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the group responsible for formulating the nation's monetary policy.

Previously, Mr. Dudley served as executive vice president of the Markets Group at the New York Fed, where he also managed the System Open Market Account for the FOMC. The Markets Group oversees domestic open market and foreign exchange trading operations and the provisions of account services to foreign central banks.

Prior to joining the Bank in 2007, Mr. Dudley was a partner and managing director at Goldman, Sachs & Company and was the firm's chief U.S. economist for a decade. Prior to joining Goldman Sachs in 1986, he was a vice president at the former Morgan Guaranty Trust Company. Mr. Dudley was an economist at the Federal Reserve Board from 1981 to 1983.

Mr. Dudley received his doctorate in economics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1982 and a bachelor's degree from New College of Florida in 1974.

In 2012, Mr. Dudley was appointed chairman of the Committee on the Global Financial System of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). Previously, Mr. Dudley served as chairman of the former Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems of the BIS from 2009 to 2012. He was a member of the board of directors of the BIS.

Bringing up the Superbowl at a Sunday BBQ is cool, but bringing up science is much less “socially acceptable”… Likewise, people read about politics and celebrity gossips, but why not the science section in newspapers and magazines? Is it just because science journalism is fundamentally less interesting? Or is it because our society lacks appreciation for science and intellectual discourse?

Mr. Mike Lemonick is here to answer those questions and provide his insights on Trump’s latest science policies. Mike is Opinion Editor at Scientific American. He has written more than 50 Time magazine cover stories on science, and has written for National Geographic, The New Yorker and other publications. 

This interview will be co-hosted by both Tiger and Brian Kraus. Brian is a graduate student in Princeton and the host of “These Vibes Are Too Cosmic,” a talk radio program at Princeton’s WPRB 103.3 FM where experts share cutting-edge science research with listeners on and off campus. It’s truly a pleasure for Policy Punchline to collaborate with Brian on this interview and share his years of science knowledge and radio show hosting experience.

Where does the future lie for Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria? Should President Trump pull U.S. troops out of Afghanistan or not? What should policy makers think about when considering whether to intervene in another country’s affairs and exporting democracy? Is the U.S. retreating itself from the global order? Has the Trump administration done any damage to the foreign services system? …

Here to answer those questions is one of the most respected career ambassadors within the U.S. Foreign Service and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom –– Ambassador Ryan Crocker. He has served as United States Ambassador to Afghanistan (2011–2012), Iraq (2007–2009), Pakistan (2004–2007), Syria (1998–2001), Kuwait (1994– 1997), and Lebanon (1990–1993).

A few punchlines?

- Before President Trump further withdrew troops, where we were in Afghanistan was adequate. It's not great, but it's not awful either. And we are helping the Afghans maintain a rough stability where they are neither losing nor gaining considerable bits of ground.

- Democracy has to be built from the ground up in terms that reflect the realities the fears and the desires of the people who actually live there.

- We should only use the military when we see no alternative except the use of military force. Getting in isn't a problem for us –– we have the greatest military on earth, and people just get out of our way when we get there, but we don't focus enough on what's next. Once the guns fall silent, as they did literally days afterwards in Iraq and in Afghanistan, that's the part of the process where we need to think through the consequences.

- Americans are known for their lack of strategic patience. We are an impatient people, and that's how we built our great country.

- There is a great sense of relief in the State Department, both foreign service and civil service, that Rex Tillerson is no longer the Secretary of State. He did more damage to the State Department and the foreign service as institutions than we have ever experienced before.

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