The EconomistJune 1st 2019 United States 352 be removed when the economy was steady
enough to cope without them.
Claudia Sahm of the Federal Reserve ar-
gued in favour of a payment to all Ameri-
cans, to be triggered by a historically accu-
rate and timely gauge of whether the
economy is in recession. The idea is not as
odd as it sounds. The payment she pro-
poses would amount to 0.7% of gdp,
around half of the typical slowdown in
consumer-spending growth in a recession,
and about as much as was paid out to Amer-
ican families as part of the Economic Stim-
ulus Act of 2008. Perhaps the biggest inno-
vation would be administrative, which is
why the planning would need to start now.
Recessions tend to involve downward
spirals of confidence and consumer spend-
ing. Separate research by Christina Patter-
son of the Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology has found that the people whose
earnings are most likely to crash with the
economy—young black men, say—cut
their spending most sharply when their in-
come falls. It thus might make sense to
fight future recessions by putting cash
straight into their wallets.
Food stamps or Temporary Assistance
for Needy Families, two welfare pro-
grammes that have an immediate impact,
could be made more generous in reces-
sions, for example. Or unemployment
benefits could be made more generous, or
more widely available. Either step would
have a more immediate effect than extend-
ing unemployment benefits for longer,
which is a perennial debate in Congress.
Ignoreland
States and local governments have histori-
cally offset around a quarter of federal-lev-
el fiscal stimulus in recessions, because of
balanced-budget requirements that force
them to tighten their belts, meaning that
stimulus from the federal government can
often be counteracted at a local level. In
theory states, cities and counties could
draw on rainy-day funds. But although an
analysis published on May 23rd by Moody’s
Analytics, a consultancy, found that “more
states are within at least striking distance
of being prepared for a moderate reces-
sion”, it found that many states were not
even close. One solution would be an auto-
matic increase in federal government
funds for state-level Medicaid and the Chil-
dren’s Health Insurance Programme,
which would then free local budgets for
other things.
Kevin Hassett, the chairman of the
Trump administration’s Council of Eco-
nomic Advisers, sees merit in the idea of
strengthening America’s automatic stabil-
isers, as it can take too long to realise a re-
cession is happening for discretionary
stimulus to arrive in time. “It’s a good time
to think about it,” he muses, recalling his
own past proposals for the government toencourage employers to share out hours
rather than make workers redundant.
But Mr Hassett points out that the
Trump administration’s near-term agenda
is already packed. He also seems sceptical
about the idea that handing out lumps of
cash would deliver much long-term help,
pointing out that the boost to gdpmay just
be temporary, and then only the bill would
be left. Mr Hassett argues that cuts to taxrates should be kept on the table.
Some wonks still hold out hope for
change in the more distant future. Fixing
America’s defences before the next reces-
sion looks unlikely. But if congressional
staffers get to work on drafting legislation
now, then when the next recession strikes
it might be possible to introduce better
automatic stabilisers—just in time for the
recession after that. 7I
t beganwitha bet.TimothyMeaher,a
rich plantation owner, thought he
could defy a decades-old federal ban on
importing Africans as slaves. He was
right. On July 9th 1860 the Clotilda, a
two-masted schooner whose journey
Meaher financed, docked in Mobile Bay.
It was the last ship to bring enslaved
Africans to America. Less than five years
after its arrival, the Union defeated the
Confederacy—which seceded from the
United States to preserve slavery in the
South—in America’s civil war.
In her hold were about 110 men, wom-
en and children who survived a harrow-
ing journey from Ouidah, a notorious
slaving port in what is today Benin. They
joined the roughly 45% of Alabama’s
population that was then enslaved. To
escape detection, the captain burned and
sank the Clotildain the bay. Her bones lay
undiscovered, amid mud and maritime
detritus, until now.
On May 22nd the Alabama Historical
Commission announced that a sunken
wreck which divers and archaeologists
had been examining for the past several
months was the Clotilda. Nothing in the
wreck bore the ship’s name. But it match-
es construction and dimensional details
gleaned from insurance documents; the
metal and wood match historical prac-
tice; and it appears to have been burned.
What happens next is unclear. After
the civil war ended many of those
brought to America on the Clotildawant-
ed to return home, but could not raise
enough money. Instead they bought land
from Meaher and established a commu-
nity known as Africatown, which today
is a proud but poor neighbourhood in
northern Mobile.
Around 2,000 people live there—
including numerous descendants of the
original inhabitants. The last survivor
died in 1937. The second-to-last, Cudjo
Lewis, died two years earlier, not long
after sitting for a series of interviews
with Zora Neale Hurston that became“Barracoon”,a searingbiography.
Africatown is an ageing neighbour-
hood, sorely lacking in private business-
es. Many hope the discovery will provide
a much-needed economic boost. Deni-
zens have suggested raising the wreck
and building a museum round it, though
that may prove difficult: the ship is most-
ly buried, and the surrounding waters are
alligator-ridden and dangerous.
Yet the discovery itself has moved
Africatown residents, whatever ulti-
mately comes of it. As one of them, Cleon
Jones, told al.com, a local news website,
“The saga began with the voyage and the
cargo of the Clotilda. Now, there can be an
ending to the story.”Diving into the wreck
Raising the ClotildaRemains of the last slave ship are discovered in southern AlabamaCudjo Lewis: cargo, slave, American