President Obama’s second State of the Union address stuck to tradition by highlighting the progress of the nation but many considered the tone of the gathering to be different – that a bipartisan, even conciliatory air prevailed. That might have been due to the seating arrangement.

President Obama focused on both the deficit and the high level of unemployment.Obama also spoke about the need for investment in high technology, science and education. Sound good to you? If it does, where should the money come from: Government or the private sector?

To answer whether there is a sound economic policy hiding underneath all that high toned rhetoric, Eight Forty-Eight was joined by two experts: Charlie Wheelan, a senior lecturer at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago, and Jeffrey Grogger, one of the nation’s leading experts on welfare reform and the Irving Harris Professor in Urban Policy at the Harris School.

Wheelan is also author of Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science. Grogger is co-author of Welfare Reform: Effects of a Decade of Change.

Music Button: Mike Reed’s People Places and Things, “Song of a Star”, from the CD Stories and Negotiations, (482 Music)