For President-elect Barack Obama’s administration to pull America out of the worst recession in nearly a century, it will first have to dig itself deeper into the largest budget deficit in American history, BU economics department Chairman Kevin Lang said.

‘Most of the actions that the administration will take will initially increase the deficit,’ he said. ‘We’re likely to see a return to old-fashioned fiscal policy because the experience is that the recession will be longer and deeper than most recent recessions.’

The last recession was in 2001 and lasted eight months, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. The fiscal policy Lang referred to is the implementation of stimulus packages intended to spur short-term economic growth.’

Upon beginning his term in office, Obama would introduce the State Growth Fund, which would funnel $25 billion into state and local governments to ‘prevent state and local cuts in health, education, housing and heating assistance or counterproductive increases in property taxes, tolls or fees,’ according to BarackObama.com.

Another $25 billion would go toward the Jobs and Growth Fund ‘to prevent cutbacks in road and bridge maintenance and fund school repair,’ in order to prevent job losses, according to the site.’

‘Normally, I would say that fiscal policy operates too slowly for that sort of thing,’ Lang said. ‘By the time local infrastructure decides what to repair, then goes out to bid and starts the project, the recession is over. But this recession seems long enough that that kind of project makes sense. That seems like a smart way to go.’

Obama’s tax policies, which involve tax-cuts for low-income tax brackets and higher taxes for the wealthy, received a heavy dose of criticism for having socialist tendencies, but Obama’s tax reforms are more of a return to the status quo, Lang said.

‘The tax rates that he’s talking about, while higher for higher-income people than they have been for most of the last eight years, are significantly lower than they’ve been for much of U.S. history,’ Lang said. ‘I don’t think we’re talking about a departure from American experience by any means.’

Economics department Associate Chairman Randall Ellis said he is surprised by the Republican criticism of ‘spreading the wealth around,’ a phrase that became the anti-mantra of Republican candidate John McCain’s camp during the campaign.

‘It’s ironic that McCain and Bush criticize it,’ he said. ‘What they did was take from the lower income and give back to the wealthy. That’s a different way of sharing the wealth, so instead one should focus on what types of redistribution programs are used.’

Intellectual trade, rather than physical trade, could have a larger long-term impact on the economy, Ellis said. Education, and research and development are ‘areas of traditional strength in the U.S.’

While the export of physical goods is what makes up the gross domestic product of the United States, the measure by which a country’s wealth is judged, the homegrown intellectual assets are what could allow for unforeseen long-term growth, Ellis said.

‘Obama has said that he wants to support it,’ he said. ‘Infrastructure like education is the right approach, not to support products or individual protection of certain goods.’

Economics professor John Harris said Obama’s character is validation for his presidency.

‘What I was struck by was his incredible capacity to have experiences and then step back and learn from them,’ he said. ‘There is a quality of mind and an ability to look at issues.’