Two of the presidential candidates’ top economic advisors, Douglas Holtz-Eakin of the John McCain camp and Austan Dean Goolsbee of the Barack Obama camp, will square off in St. Louis for a spirited debate on the candidates’ economic platforms beginning at 9 a.m. Oct. 2, the day of the vice presidential debate on the nearby campus of Washington University in St. Louis.
Free and open to the public, the “Debate Between Economic Advisers to McCain and Obama” will be held in the Lee Auditorium of the Missouri History Museum in Forest Park, near the intersection of Lindell Boulevard and DeBaliviere Ave.
The History Museum is located a few minutes from the Washington University Athletic Complex, where the vice presidential debate between Democrat Joe Biden and Republican Sarah Palin kicks off at 8 p.m.
The economic advisors debate is co-sponsored by Washington University’s Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy and the St. Louis Gateway Chapter of the National Association of Business Economics. Additional funding for this event is provided by Macroeconomic Advisers, LLC.
Steven Fazzari, Ph.D., associate director of the Weidenbaum Center and professor of economics in Arts & Sciences, will moderate the debate between Holtz-Eakin and Goolsbee,
Holtz-Eakin serves as Senior Policy Advisor for John McCain 2008. Previously, Dr. Holtz-Eakin served as the Director of the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies and the Paul A. Volcker Chair in International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations. Prior to that, Dr. Holtz-Eakin served as the sixth Director of the Congressional Budget Office, where he was appointed for a four-year term beginning February 4, 2003. Dr. Holtz-Eakin previously served for eighteen months as Chief Economist for the President’s Council of Economic Advisers. Prior to that, Dr. Holtz-Eakin served as a Trustee Professor of Economics at the Maxwell School, Syracuse University. At the Maxwell School, he served as Chairman of the Department of Economics and Associate Director of the Center for Policy Research.
Dean Goolsbee is an economist and is currently the Robert P. Gwinn Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. He is also a Research Fellow at the American Bar Foundation, Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and on leave as a member of the Panel of Economic Advisors to the Congressional Budget Office and writes the Economic Scene column for the New York Times. He has been Barack Obama’s economic advisor since Obama’s successful U.S. Senate campaign in Illinois. Goolsbee’s academic research focuses on the Internet, the new economy, government policy, and taxes. He is a Fulbright Scholar, an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow and was named one of the 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum in Switzerland.
Parking is available on the east and west sides of the museum and in the lot at Government and Cricket Drives in Forest Park.
For information, visit the Weidenbaum Center website at wc.wustl.edu or call 314-935-5652.
For media assistance or to arrange an interview through our free VYVX and ISDN lines, please contact:
Gerry Everding
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gerry_everding@wustl.edu
(314) 935-6375