Members of Congress return to Washington this week for the so-called lame duck session.
The bleak economy, a result of four years of Democratic congressional control and two years of President Obama’s heavy-handed policies, means there will be a lot of pressure to adopt even more aggressive economic policies intended to create jobs and stimulate the economy.
But that’s not what the economy needs; rather, it should learn from the Cessna.
While a graduate student I decided to take flying lessons. The instructor I chose liked to use small, single-engine, two-seater Cessnas as training planes.
One day the instructor said we were going up in the Cessna Aerobat, which was built a little sturdier to withstand aerobatic maneuvers.
Once in the air, the instructor told me to pull back on the wheel and turn hard to the left. The purpose was to put the plane in a downward spin. The nose tipped over and down we went, round and round, in a death spiral towards the ground.
I started to get a little nervous when the instructor told me what I needed to do: Slowly let off on the controls. I did and the plane gradually straightened out and began flying normally.
The instructor explained that a Cessna is made to fly, and so takes very little human effort. The problem, he continued, is when an inexperienced pilot gets in a fog or loses his bearings in the dark; he may start pulling back on the wheel thinking he’s going down.
Unless that pilot gets a grip on himself and does what may seem to be counterintuitive at the time, let go of the controls, he’ll take himself down and everyone with him.
An economy is a lot like that Cessna because it too is made to fly. Consumers want to buy, retailers want to sell, employers want to hire and banks want to lend. And they will if policymakers aren’t pulling back on the controls.
As Congress returns the members will be encouraged by myriad voices to pull hard and oversteer the economy. But they need to remember the lesson from that Cessna: Just let go of the controls.