Something Popperian is going on at The Smithsonian.
In one of the most iconic moments in modern economics, professor Arthur Laffer
sketches a curve on a bar napkin (this was in 1974, at the Two Continents
restaurant, across the street from the Treasury Departmment) to show an aide to
Gerald R. Ford why the federal government should cut taxes.
In 2015, The Smithsonian announces that it was putting the napkin on display.
Laffer, however, says the napkin is most likely a keepsake.
Among the Popperian clues:
The napkin on display is cloth, while the original napkin was paper.
The napkin on display is dated 9/13/74, while the original meeting took place
after the November 1974 midterm elections.
And the napkin on display is inscribed to Donald H. Rumsfeld, then Ford’s chief
of staff. Laffer met with Dick Cheney, Mr. Rumsfeld’s deputy.
Laffer adds for Popperian effect: “Look at how neatly it was done! You tell me
how, late at night with a glass of wine, you’re going to do it that neatly.”
The credit at the Smithsonian reads: “Economist Art Laffer sketched a new
direction for the Republican Party on *this* napkin, illustrating his theory
that lowering taxes increased economic activity.”
Brian Domitrovic, of Sam Houston State University who has researched on the
creation of the Laffer Curve, says, using almost anti-Popperian terms, the sum
of the available evidence showed that the Smithsonian’s napkin “most certainly”
is “an ex post facto creation.”
The Smithsonian acquired the napkin in 2013. It was donated by Mrs. Wanniski.
But Peter Liebhold, the curator for The Smithsonian’s division of work and
industry, who acquired the napkin in 2013, said the museum was confident of its
authenticity.
The Laffer napkin has long been shrouded in mystery, partly because none of
those present at the original meeting thought that it was particularly historic
at the time.
Laffer met with Cheney for drinks at the Two Continents with Wanniski in
December. Wanniski brought Grace-Marie Arnett, a friend.
At the restaurant, Laffer grows frustrated as he tried to explain the value of
tax cuts to Cheney, finally grabbing a paper napkin so he could draw a visual
aid. The Laffer curve looks, if we may use Wittgensteinian parlance (he was
obsessed with verbs of ‘seeming’) like the nose of an airplane, and is meant to
show that higher tax rates can reduce tax revenues — and lower tax rates can
bring in more money.
Arnett says that she recalls the moment vividly because she had never seen the
Laffer Curve before, and she found it illuminating.
Arnett, alla anti-Popper, said she is *certain* that the meeting had happened
after the elections (because until then, she was working for a Republican House
candidate in Texas.) And, more importantly, she adds, echoing almost A. J.
Ayer, the philosopher of knowledge-as-certainty, “I absolutely *know* that it
was a paper cocktail napkin.”
Laffer adds: “There was a napkin done at the Two Continents, but I don’t know,
alas where it ended. Probably in the trash.”
It was Mrs. Patricia Wanniski who found the cloth napkin at the back of a
drawer of Wanniski’s clothing – and donated to The Smithsonian.
Popper might wonder: why did Laffer dedicate the napkin to Mr. Rumsfeld and
write the date “9/13/74”?
One possible “explanation” is suggested by Rumsfeld. His datebook shows that he
dined with Laffer and Cheney on Sept. 16, 1975, and that he had made a note at
the time that Laffer drew a curve “on a napkin.”
Is it possible, Leibnix would ask, Laffer reprised that napkin for Wanniski,
creating a reproduction of a reproduction?
Laffer says, alla A. J. Ayer, he simply is not sure. (vide Ayer’s account of
‘knowledge’ as subjective certainty).
As if to refute Popper, Laffer adds for effect: “It is hard to say which napkin
was which and when and where.”
Cheers,
Speranza