SUMMARY DESCRIPTION

Materials on economic policy and conditions accumulated during McCracken's three-week appointment to help with the 1974 Conference on Inflation and Ford's subsequent special economic address.

QUANTITY
1.6 linear feet (ca. 3,200 pages)

DONOR
Gerald R. Ford (accession number 77-107)

ACCESS
Open. Some items are temporarily restricted under terms of the donor's deed of gift, a copy of which is available on request, or under National Archives and Records Administration general restrictions (36 CFR 1256).

COPYRIGHT
Gerald Ford donated to the United States of America his copyrights in all of his unpublished writings in National Archives collections. The copyrights to materials written by other individuals or organizations are presumed to remain with them. Works prepared by U.S. Government employees as part of their official duties are in the public domain.

Prepared by Barbara J. White, April 1983
[s:\bin\findaid\mccracken, paul - files.doc]

BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

Paul W. McCracken

December 29, 1915 - Born, Richland, Iowa

1937 - B.A., William Penn College

1942 - M.A., Harvard University

1943-48 - Financial economist & director of research, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis

1948 - Ph.D., Harvard University

1948-66 - Professor of economics, University of Michigan

1956-59 - Member, Council of Economic Advisers

1966-present Edmund Ezra Day University Professor of Business Administration, University of Michigan

1969-71 - Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers

Sept.-Oct. 1974 - Consultant to Counsellor Rush

1981-? - Member, President's Advisory Board on Economic Policy

n.a. - Professor Emeritus of Business Administration, Economics, and Public Policy, University of Michigan

Aug. 3, 2012 - Died, Ann Arbor, MI

INTRODUCTION

In September and October 1974, Paul W. McCracken served a three-week appointment as consultant to Kenneth Rush, Counsellor to the President for Economic Policy. Rush was also Chairman of the Steering Committee for the Conference on Inflation, formed jointly from the executive and congressional branches. L. William Seidman was executive director of the Conference on Inflation and became the Assistant to the President for Economic Affairs on September 30th. Seidman assumed the duties of chief economic adviser to the President from Rush, who was nominated as Ambassador to France on September 4th.

As consultant to Rush, McCracken was responsible for organizing, preparing, and analyzing materials on economic policies and projects. He aided in the preparations for the Conference of Inflation, held on September 27-28, 1974, in Washington, D.C. This summit conference was preceeded by twelve sector conferences on inflation held around the country. McCracken prepared a summary of these conferences for the steering committe, and later drafted portions of the President's economic address, delivered on October 8th and based on the conference results and departmental input.

The files created by McCracken consist of material preparatory to the final summit conference and the President's address. Included are examples of the outpouring of public mail containing suggestions on fighting inflation, and economic input received from RCA, Condecor, Incorporated, General Telephone and Electronics Corporation, and from C. Jackson Grayson, Jr., of the American Productivity Center, on productivity. In addition, McCracken received brief papers and proposals on specific economic policy issues from 16 governmental departments and agencies prior to the conference. His summary of the conferences was transmitted to the steering committee on October 1st as the "Catalogue of Economic Policy Recommendations from the Conference Meetings." This catalogue is an excellent overview of the economic policy issues, ideas and recommendations from the twelve sector and final conferences. He was assisted by members of Rush's staff, Sidney L. Jones and John E. Robson, and by John R. Brodman, Cost of Living Council.

Input from governmental departments and agencies for the President's Economic Policy Address consists of proposals and draft speech segments on specific subjects, such as energy. Also included are McCracken's handwritten speech drafts.

Related Materials (April 1983)
Materials relating to McCracken's responsibilities may be found in the files of L. William Seidman, especially the Conference on Inflation series; the files of staff members in Seidman's office; the files of Kenneth Rush; and in several White House Central File categories, including Meetings - Conferences (MC) 3-1, Economic Summit Meeting; Speeches (SP) 2-3-11, President's Message to Congress; and Business - Economics (BE).

SERIES DESCRIPTIONS

Conference on Inflation Subject File, 1974.  (Boxes 1-4, 1.6 linear feet)
Correspondence with the public and businesspersons, memoranda, reports, conference summaries, press releases, exhibits, printed materials and annotated and handwritten draft policy proposals and speeches. Topics include recommendations on economic policy analysis, suggestions on inflation, the Conference on Inflation, and the President's October 8, 1974 economic policy address.

Arranged alphabetically by subject.

View container list for this series

CONTAINER LIST

Box 1 - Conference on Inflation Subject File

• Burns, Arthur (Chairman, Federal Reserve Board)
• Brodman, John
• Catalogue of Economic Policy Recommendations from the Conference Meeting (1)-(3)
• Condecor, Inc. - Inflation Meeting, 9/29/74
• Conference on Inflation
• Conference on Inflation - Steering Committee Report
• Conference on Inflation - Suggestions Received from the Public (1)-(4)

Box 2 - Conference on Inflation Subject File

• Conference on World Monetary Disorder, 5/23-25/74 (1)-(2)
• Council on Environmental Quality
• Economic Policy Address
  - Agriculture - Council on Wage and Price Stability
  - Energy
  - General
  - HEW - HUD
  - Interior - OMB

Box 3 - Conference on Inflation Subject File

• Economic Policy Board
• Economic Policy Input
  - Agriculture Department
  - Council of Economic Advisers
  - Council on Environmental Policy
  - Council on International Economic Policy
  - Commerce Department
  - Federal Energy Administration (1)-(2)
  - General
  - HEW - Labor

Box 4 - Conference on Inflation Subject File

• Economic Policy Input
  - Office of Management and Budget
  - Other Agencies
  - State - Transportation
  - Treasury Department
• Energy
• Fiedler, Ed (Department of Treasury)
• Financial Conference on Inflation
• Grayson, C. Jackson, Jr. (American Productivity Center)
• Personnel
• Productivity Program
• Public Utilities Exhibit
• RCA (Radio Corporation of America)
• Robertson, Norm (Economic Office, Mellon Bank)
• Robson, John (Consultant to Kenneth Rush)
• Treasury Department