Interview with Paul Ginsburg and Gail Ginsburg

Interview with Paul Ginsburg and Gail Ginsburg

Ginsburg, Paul ; Ginsburg, Gail ; Gashurov, Irene

Harpur College – Sixties alumni; Harpur College – Alumni in higher education; Harpur College – Alumni in health policy; Harpur College – Alumni at University of Southern California; Harpur College – Alumni at the Brookings Institution; Harpur College – Alumni at the Rand Corporation; Harpur College – Alumni at the U.S. Congressional Budget Office; Harpur College – Alumni from New York City; Harpur College – Alumni living in the DC area; Harpur College – Alumni in medical research; Harpur College – Alumni at the National Institutes of Health

Paul Ginsburg, PhD is the director, USC-Brookings Schaeffer Initiative for Health Policy and the Leonard D. Schaeffer Chair in Health Policy Studies, The Brookings Institution; and Professor of Health Policy and Director of Public Policy, Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics, University of Southern California. He also worked at the Rand Corporation, the Congressional Budget Office (1978-84), wrote policies that informed Hillary Clinton's health policy and founded the Center for Studying Health System Change.

Gail is a microbiologist with the grants office at the National Institutes of Health.

2018-03-12

In Copyright

Paul and Gail Ginsburg.mp3

2018-03-12

Oral Histories from 60's Binghamton Alumni

99:53 minutes

Alumni Interviews
Interview with: Paul B. Ginsburg and Gail T. Ginsburg
Interviewed by: Irene Gashurov
Transcriber: Oral History Lab
Date of interview: 12 March 2018
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(Start of Interview)

IG: 00:01
-ask you to introduce yourselves and just say, when you were born, what years you attended Binghamton, and what we are doing here.

PG: 00:14
Okay.

IG: 00:16
Where we are.

PG: 00:17
Yeah, I am Paul. I am Paul Ginsburg, and I was born in 1945 graduated from Binghamton, which we called Harpur College, then in 1965 so I was very much a youngster, as many of my peers from New York City were at that time.

GG: 00:42
And I am Gail Ginsburg. I was born in 1948 and I graduated in 1968 also it was Harpur College at that point, and I think that is all right.

IG: 01:01
So, what-what are we doing here?

PG: 01:03
Oh, sure. And we are being interviewed by Irene Gashurov-

IG: 01:09
Yes.

PG: 01:10
-who's doing--what do you call it?

IG: 01:12
Oral history.

PG: 01:13
Oral history of the college in the 1960s.

GG: 01:18
Of which we have some experience. [laughter]

IG: 01:23
Alright, so Paul, let us begin with you. So just tell us a little bit about where you grew up. You mentioned New York, who your parents were, you know, what-what, whether they encouraged you to go to college,

PG: 01:39
Yeah. Well, so I did grow up in New York, New York City, in the Bronx, and there was never any discussion about going to college. It was assumed. And I assumed it as well. I was very intrigued about the idea of going away to college, which perhaps is a reason that I wound up going to Harpur rather than one of the city university colleges in New York City.

IG: 02:11
So, your parents-

PG: 02:12
Oh, and sorry, you know, my parents were native born. They were- their parents were immigrants, and my father was an administrator in the New York City government. And my mother, I think by that point, had been working also in the New York City government. I think she went back to work when my brother and I were in high school.

IG: 02:44
I am curious. Where were the immigrants from?

PG: 02:48
Oh, Russia.

PG: 02:48
From Russia.

PG: 02:49
But not my parents. Their-their parents.

IG: 02:51
They were [inaudible]. I understand your grandparents. Do you know where?

PG: 02:56
Yeah, I think I know my father's family came from Belarus, what today is called Belarus.

IG: 03:03
It was a Russian Empire.

PG: 03:04
That is right.

IG: 03:07
And you Gail, where did you grow up? Who your parents were, you know?

GG: 03:14
So, I grew up on Staten Island in one of the boroughs of New York City. I went to high school in Manhattan, so I had a long commute to high school. My parents were from New Jersey, and their families went back a long time. I have relatives who lived in Rahway in going back to the early 1800s but they moved to Staten Island because they had a business opportunity. They bought a small business, and just before my father was drafted into World War Two, and my mom stayed and worked the whole business during the war. And so, I was raised, probably by the original feminist. They were not college educated, but they- there was no question we were going to college. My sister, who's older, went to college, and it seemed like a good experience. So, it was never a question I was going to go to college.

IG: 04:20
So why did you decide on Harpur College?

GG: 04:29
Well-

IG: 04:31
What was the reputation that you knew of Harpur College at the time?

GG: 04:35
I would not say there was a lot of decision in that. My family was pretty unsophisticated when it came to understanding about colleges compared to the knowledge that Paul and I have now. It is probably shared with our children. You just applied where a guidance counselor thought you had a chance to get in. And in some of the places I applied to, I was not accepted in. I was first year of the baby booms, and so there were a lot of surprises that year on acceptances, and Harpur just seemed like a very good choice. Some of the other choices I had were very expensive, and my father had just lost a lot of money, so he was really happy for me to go to Harpur.

IG: 05:25
Well, it is maybe too personal to ask how he lost a lot of money.

GG: 05:29
He was a businessman.

IG: 05:32
Okay, [inaudible]

GG: 05:33
He was not necessarily low risk kind of person. He had his company, and he retained that, but he had invested a lot of money in a-a process that-that coated fabric, and this- his friend of his had a patent on it, and they started their business, and they were really out competed by DuPont. It was pretty hard for them to get muscle into that market. So, he lost a fair amount of money at that point, and it was just before I was that year and a half before I started college. But we were not impoverished. [crosstalk]

PG: 06:15
I went to Harpur because I mentioned I wanted to be in a residential school, and just given my sense of what the tuition would be, even with scholarships at private universities, the tuition difference was very large. And my parents were a fairly modest income and-and I was impressed with Harpur's reputation. The fact that it was a small liberal arts college was attractive to me.

IG: 06:52
Did you visit it before your first semester?

PG: 06:56
No.

IG: 06:57
And, yeah-yeah. So, what were some of your first impressions when you two city kids came to this very rural place?

GG: 06:57
No.

GG: 07:07
Well, my sister went to Elmira college, so I was already familiar with the southern tier, so it did not surprise me that much. The one thing that surprised me was that it was kind of far out of town. It was like a suburban location, and I was sort of surprised at that, especially since few of us had cars, it was kind of isolating.

PG: 07:32
Yeah, I would say that, you know, I knew it was going to be somewhat rural, well, not really rural, but just in a small city location. It did not disappoint me. I did not expect to have much time for taking advantage of the location. I expected to be really mostly involved in both work and campus social activities, so I never had that much interest, actually, of getting off campus, because so much was there on the campus.

IG: 08:09
Did you anticipate what type of social activities these would be, just kind of hanging out with other young people or?

PG: 08:17
Yeah, being with other people. There was, at least at that time, a lot of culture was brought to the campus, you know, concerts, movies, actually, there seemed to be plenty to do. I was not as focused on food as I am now. So, the fact that the food was going to be awful, and was truly awful, and that they were no convenient restaurants right nearby did not factor in.

IG: 08:49
So-so what was your program of study? What-what did you major in?

PG: 08:55
Oh, well, I started out as a math major, but had an interest in economics. And when I got to the- guess, my fourth math course in, say, the spring of my sophomore year, that is when I decided that math was not for me, and I, you know, was well along in economics and decided that is what I would do.

IG: 09:26
So, what- who were, you know, maybe some of the faculty that made an impression on you, what-what changed you from wanting to pursue math as a as a subject of study to economics?

PG: 09:44
Well, that is hard to say. I mean, it is- I did have an outstanding initial math teacher, perhaps for the full year and a half calculus sequence. And but there is nothing wrong with it. Teacher after that, it was a striking change in the nature of the subjects to highly theoretical mathematics, whereas the first three semesters were quite practical. Same, you know, an engineer might have taken that course, not that there were engineering students at Harpur at the time, so I always characterize it as just seeing what at least the math major was conceived of at Harpur. And, you know, did not find that engaging. I think I had a very good- all the freshmen took a social science course at the time which exposed them to all of the social sciences. And when they were sophomores, they actually took an introductory course in selected social science. And both my social science course and gone very well. I kind of remember the instructor was a young man with a dashing silver streak in his hair. And we used to refer to him students as the Silver Streak. But he was, you know, charismatic teacher. And so, in a sense, then I began the regular economics course. I enjoyed that a great deal.

IG: 11:26
So, what appealed to you about economics? How did it open vistas for you- your understanding of the world?

PG: 11:34
Yeah, I just found the subject matter very engaging. And, you know, sticking with economics and becoming a professional economist, I think the thing now, I could think of it as the ability to, you know, think very analytically and to understand an economy and how things impact. It just very engaging all the time.

IG: 12:04
But nothing-nothing particular and nothing, nothing you know, a gem of insight does not stand out from those years that you all of a sudden, because of this course of study, something began to make sense. Your apprehension of the world changed. No, it was not like that.

PG: 12:24
No, I think it was just, it was a subject I had not been exposed to high school.

IG: 12:29
Yeah.

PG: 12:31
There are high school economics courses these days. I do not know how successful they are, but it was just-just finding the subject matter very engaging.

IG: 12:40
Right-right. Any so, any professors in economics that you would like to mention as having a particular impact?

PG: 12:50
Yeah, I would say the it was Professor John Latourette. Actually, I liked a lot of the faculty. It was Latourette, too. I do not remember if I took the introductory course from him or not, but I know he was my advisor, and as a senior, actually did some research with him and-and I remember some Alfred Carlip was, you know, very good professor, someone named, I think, Leiman [Melvin Leiman], where the subject matter of the course was not that interesting, but I liked him. So, there were a lot of engaging professors there at the time. Cannot think of anyone I did not like. Oh, and then, actually, the professor at my senior seminar, his name is Vucasin [Peter Vukasin], was an outstanding teacher and helped me decide which graduate school to go to.

IG: 13:59
And where did you go?

PG: 14:01
I went to Harvard. And what he told me is that, see, I had gotten into all that I had applied to, all in the same day that I had been awarded a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, which, at that time used to have money attached to it, and so they all accepted me, since I had my own money.

IG: 14:22
So where did you get where else did you get accepted?

PG: 14:25
Oh, I think Yale, Johns, Hopkins, those are the ones I remember.

IG: 14:30
Why did you choose Harvard? I mean-

PG: 14:33
Well, what Vukasin said to me is that, in a sense, "You do not have very specific, defined interests. Go to Harvard. You like Cambridge," and I guess that was pretty good advice.

IG: 14:48
And so, did you do a PhD, or?

PG: 14:50
Yes, what I should tell you, I am sure you have heard it from some others, is that I would much rather have worked as an economist after college to see what it was like.

IG: 15:02
Right.

PG: 15:04
I did not expect to be an academic and but you know, that was better than being drafted.

IG: 15:12
Right.

PG: 15:14
Reason I got a PhD is both learning that the-the top programs in economics did not bother with master's programs. What I found actually at Harvard is that the master's degree was what was given to the students that the PhD students who were not going to make it-

PG: 15:40
To the PhD.

PG: 15:41
-to PhD level. So, in a sense, and there were, there is a lot of scholarship money for PhD programs, nothing for master's programs at lesser universities. So, I got into a PhD program.

IG: 15:59
Gail, did you, you know, were you married at the time, or what-what?

GG: 16:07
No.

IG: 16:07
Okay, so let us, let us trace back to your course of study at Binghamton, and what you know, why you chose the major that you did and what faculty made a particular impression on your formation? If you, if you can say that

GG: 16:29
Sure, I started out as initially as a science major. I was interested in biology or chemistry, I was not sure, and so I started the introductory--the initial years of requirements are pretty similar between those two majors. So, I started those programs, and then I also in taking your distribution requirements, found that I really liked literature, and so I was taking, kind of following this path for the first two years, of taking trying to meet my distribution requirements, but also taking my science and then I would take extra literature courses as I could fit them in, and there was always a competition between the two. But in the sense that I- in my comparative anatomy class, I think it was Professor Landry [Stuart O. Landry] was the professor, and he saw my notebook and realized that I could sketch. And so, he had me- I did some illustrations for him. And it was a lot of fun.

IG: 17:50
What kind of illustrations?

GG: 17:51
They were anatomical. In those days, most biology was very descriptive.

IG: 17:55
Right.

GG: 17:56
So, it was skulls, all different kinds of skulls. He was, I guess, doing comparative analysis of the evolution of the- these different animals. And it was very interesting, because I had kind of a distant, not-not very much, not a firm relative, but very distant one who was a medical illustrator, and so I had actually seen some of his work, and he- so there was this one side with me, doing art and science, and then the other side was the literature professor at the same time, Robert Kroetsch, who was a writer, novelist, and he was a fantastic professor, and he kept urging me to major in literature. So, I had these competing interests, and I- there are two things that made me really made literature actually went out in the end, and that was that I did not know what I was going to do with a science major. I did not think that I wanted to go to medical school, and absolutely all my classmates in my science classes were highly competitive, all wanting to get to medical school and make it killing financially, they were not fun to be classmates with, and I just did not think that that was going to be the thing for me. I knew that there was a very strong prejudice against women in the science in those days, it was hard, it was hard, to see a path forward, and literature was so much fun, and I did not think that far in advance. I do not think I planned that much in those days. I think that is the disadvantage of starting college at 16. You know, you were still a high school kid.

IG: 19:57
Yes.

GG: 19:58
Basically, you do not really have, uh, the social sense, or the drive.

IG: 20:02
Right.

GG: 20:03
That is someone who's been out more.

GG: 20:05
The only drive I knew was that I had to finish college because my parents would be mortally just so opposed to my dropping out of college. And I never thought about it. I really liked college material, and I actually used to like studying for finals, because it kind of was a way to kind of pull together a whole body of information. And I am someone who-

IG: 20:05
Of course.

IG: 20:30
In literature you like, or any subject?

GG: 20:33
Any subject, yeah, I just found that I am not good at the little details. I am really good at putting together patterns. And somehow patterns fell into place studying for a final. So, I had this overview that I always felt gave me more understanding, at least the best that I could at that point, I was not the most dedicated student also going to laugh at that. And so, you know, if I could get away with not working that hard, I certainly would. And I spent a lot of time off campus because I found Binghamton very boring. So, I have spent a lot of time up in Ithaca.

IG: 21:13
Yeah. So, you had a car, or somebody-

GG: 21:16
I had a friend who had a car, yeah, and the two of us would just go roaming. We had a great time, and I do not know. So eventually I did become a literature major, be more, because I just did not know what I was going to do. And in those days, you could graduate from college, and that was sufficient to get a job,

PG: 21:36
A good job.

IG: 21:38
A good job. Yeah.

GG: 21:40
And so, but so that is basically what I did. And I would say those two professors were very influential on me. Of all professors I had, first of all, because I still remember their names, that means something. And they just all took a personal interest in me, and that I thought was, I did not know if that was a feature of college in general, or just maybe that is an aspect of being a relatively small school as it was at that time, but I appreciated that because you did not feel anonymous at all.

IG: 22:19
Did they invite you to their homes? Did you have any extra [crosstalk] curricular activities with them? Did they have dinners or?

GG: 22:29
Actually, there was a third professor that, I think back on it. He was, I think he had invited me to his house. I remember he had these fancy pigeons in the cage in his kitchen. They were really quite spectacular, and his wife was wonderful. Dr. Landry, I think he gave me a ride somewhere. I mean, they were nice people-

IG: 22:52
Nice people.

GG: 22:55
But it was not like I felt like I socialized with them.

IG: 22:58
Right. Were there any stars that you remember in the English Department?

GG: 23:03
Well, I think Kroetsch was. He left the university around the time I was graduating, or he was on leave. I do not know if he actually came back or not. He was Canadian. I think he eventually went up to Canada again.

IG: 23:21
Did you take part- I am just curious, what-what, so what-what path did your career take?

GG: 23:28
Oh, that is the interesting part. I kept circling back to science, no matter how I turned. That is what I wound up in. So, what is the job I get when I finish college? I interview to be a secretary. Because remember, in those days, they used to have two lines at employment offices, the men went the executive route and the women went the secretarial so I being ignorant. I just did what they said. And during my interview, woman said, "You are not going to be happy being a secretary," and I wound up in the in designing circuit boards at a small engineering company in Boston.

IG: 24:15
How did that happen? From secretarial to was it your science degree? [crosstalk] How did you decide circuit boards?

GG: 24:22
I did not.

IG: 24:22
I could not.

GG: 24:22
I did not. She just decided, for me, she knew that. I guess she must have been aware of what jobs were open, and I did not have, you did not have to be an engineer.

IG: 24:33
Right.

GG: 24:33
You just have to understand components and tolerances, and they can teach you that. And the engineers were in offices down the hallway. But what I did was it was like a puzzle. I mean, it is like they paid me to do puzzles. It was so much fun.

IG: 24:46
And what was the what was the time and company, and?

GG: 24:50
Oh, do you remember the name of the company?

PG: 24:53
Yeah, [inaudible]

GG: 24:54
Is it?

GG: 24:55
Yeah, I think they made equipment for testing, for quality control.

PG: 24:59
Yeah-yeah, I cannot think of [crosstalk]

GG: 25:01
[crosstalk] anything right now. I only worked there for a few months, and then my father was- who had been ill most of my life, was really ill, and my mom wanted me to move back home, which I did, so then I came home and helped her run the family business after my dad passed away.

PG: 25:22
You know, one thing I have been mentioning thinking about since we talked before about, and Gail mentioned being young. This was a major thing, because, you know, almost all of the students from New York City, which might have been half of the student body, were young, and so it really, I think it limited how much they got out of college. It limited the kind of activities they sought out, maybe even limited them intellectually, like when I think of it, my fourth semester, all of a sudden, I started doing--I was doing okay, but I started doing very well, and that continued throughout, probably just a matter of maturity.

IG: 26:09
It was a matter of maturity, did you say?

PG: 26:11
Yeah, probably a matter of just maturity.

IG: 26:13
Yeah, that is that is an interesting observation. I have also thought that in my life as well, that at a certain point you either read- reach a critical mass. But it does have to do with maturity and yet, and yet, you know you were. I mean, there are prodigies at a young age, and you already had a sense of the direction that you wanted to take in math, and then you switched to economics, so you had the intellectual wherewithal to pursue that too.

PG: 26:51
Well, there are different interpretations. You could say, well, maybe if he was more maturing-

IG: 26:55
Yeah, he would do more.

PG: 26:56
-would have handled math differently.

IG: 26:59
So-so do you think that the, you know, well, I mean-

PG: 27:03
I do not think that was the case. I do not think, looking back, that was actually the case.

IG: 27:07
Yeah.

PG: 27:08
They were just saying that there are possibilities of students who went different directions, perhaps because they were quite young,

IG: 27:16
Yeah.

PG: 27:17
That might have, might not have been the best for them.

IG: 27:20
Right. So-

GG: 27:23
I think, I think there are always aspects, [inaudible] in an environment that influences you. Just as I was saying that I did not know how I could have a path forward for science job in just pure chemistry, say, I think that is a reality at that time, it would have been very difficult, and so that had nothing to do with my age, but there is all these other external factors that one processes as you go through.

PG: 27:53
but I actually think that my young age, unlike you, my young age, made me quite satisfied with campus life in a way that you were not.

IG: 28:03
So, what did you do? I mean, campus life, how was it, how was it fun?

PG: 28:09
Well, in a sense, it was, first of all, I was not home.

IG: 28:11
Yes.

PG: 28:13
I had all these friends, you know, right nearby. You know, could get together with them, quickly, or, you know, without spending a lot of time traveling. I mentioned before there were all these events going on that were, and many of these events were, you know, very important to me. You know, being exposed to foreign movies, being exposed to jazz performers and quartets. There was a quartet [crosstalk] quartet.

IG: 28:47
And what do you remember, any of the musicians, any of the-

PG: 28:53
Oh, some of the jazz musicians.

IG: 28:54
Where did they perform? At the student union or there was an auditorium.

PG: 28:58
There was an auditorium, there was an auditorium, and then in some cases it was the gym, which is somewhat bigger, but the most of it in the auditorium. You know, as well as student productions and so you know, between the people, and you know, people were in social clubs, which was, you know, really, just for parties-

GG: 29:30
And for men.

PG: 29:32
Well, there was some women's clubs, were not there-- much less probably.

IG: 29:36
What were the clubs that you were in?

PG: 29:38
I was in [inaudible].

IG: 29:39
What is that?

PG: 29:41
It is just a Greek name. [laughter]

GG: 29:44
[crosstalk] national fraternities.

PG: 29:47
No-no, they were not. They were, they were all specific to Harpur and really just another social you know, to some extent, like fraternities, but people I-I remember, actually, you know, we got together for parties, but also just sometimes, just the older people would, you know, take the group out to a bar and, you know, just to drink beer on a Friday night.

IG: 30:22
Well, that is, I mean, that is fun, especially when you are, you know-

PG: 30:27
When you were 16-

IG: 30:28
-when you were 16 is, you know, it was an entry into adulthood.

PG: 30:32
That is right.

IG: 30:33
Would you, would you imagine adulthood to be. So-so, you know, so you were having fun and socializing and participating in clubs, but it was also the time of Vietnam.

PG: 30:49
No.

IG: 30:50
It was before Vietnam, because-

PG: 30:52
I was there, before Vietnam [crosstalk]

IG: 30:54
Before it affected your-your-

PG: 30:56
Yeah, Vietnam was not very prominent.

IG: 30:59
It was not very so, so there was not a fear of the draft, or-

PG: 31:03
I mean, there was not, I mean, definitely. Well, I remember, actually, not that far, long before I graduated, because of Vietnam getting started, there was a change in draft policy.

IG: 31:14
How did it change?

PG: 31:16
It used to be that, you know, I think they started maybe exempting fathers, and that meant they were drafting more of other people. You know, I do not remember the details now, but the bottom line was that I was, oh, I know what it was, is that they were not drafting men until they were 23, 24 and there was a policy to exempt fathers. And by exempting fathers, the draft age for the non-fathers fell. So, in a sense, it would be, and it fallen down to 20 or 21 perhaps. So, it meant that. So, it was not like there was all this anti-war, although I think the war was becoming unpopular then, and there probably were some activities in my last year, but it was just a matter of, oh, I am going to be drafted. I do not want that.

IG: 32:12
So, I mean, for you, it is kind of a moot point, because you were determined to go on to your graduate-

PG: 32:22
No.

IG: 32:22
-studies anyway.

PG: 32:23
No.

IG: 32:23
No.

PG: 32:24
No, I would not have gone to graduate school.

IG: 32:26
You would not have gone.

PG: 32:27
No.

IG: 32:27
I see.

PG: 32:28
Maybe later.

IG: 32:29
Maybe later.

GG: 32:32
When, in the end, he was so young when he graduated. For graduate school, he was still eligible.

IG: 32:39
Right.

GG: 32:40
So, he [inaudible] two years.

IG: 32:45
So, he-

PG: 32:46
Yeah, so I was in had a commission in the Public Health Service to meet my service obligation.

IG: 32:53
Oh, and where was that? And what? What nature of service was it?

PG: 32:59
Oh, I was used interchangeably with federal civil servants in Rockville, that but as a commission as Lieutenant Commander in the Public Health Service.

GG: 33:13
But he had a low enough number in the lottery, he would have been drafted for the army.

IG: 33:17
That is terrible.

PG: 33:18
Yeah.

IG: 33:21
So did the war- I mean, did you come from a liberal or conservative background? Did the war change your thinking in any way about politics, about-

PG: 33:35
Yeah, I would call them. I would say came from a moderate democratic background. And the, you know, the war was not popular there with me. But you know, this did not come from an environment that was going to go out and demonstrate an- and that is not me either.

IG: 34:04
That is not you either. [laughter]

GG: 34:14
As far as the war, my parents were both staunch Republicans. I did not pay any attention to politics, particularly. But it was interesting that as the war progressed, when my father had passed away, so I do not know if he would have evolved in this in this area, but my mom started to become strong anti-war person. So, it was interesting how as a moderate Republican, she moved very strongly against that position over time, because she remembered World War Two, when my father was in the army for three years, fighting in European front. And she thought it was horrible. I mean, she just really hated war and so that so for people who had that World War Two experience, not everyone came through saying, you know, waving the flag all the time, even if they were conservative. So that is that was a deal breaker for her.

IG: 35:20
Yeah, it must have affected you to have your mother, to see your mother evolve.

GG: 35:27
I thought it was interesting. I, you know, I my mother and I are very independent people, and I do not have any difficulty being with people who have a different opinion, political opinion. I was used to it. There was a range of political views, few points in my extended family, and it was I was comfortable with that. It did not matter to me so much. I thought it was a big deal for her to change, because I thought there was a lot of pressure among conservatives to kind of hold down the fort and keep to the position. So, I thought it just indicated to me that she was independent in how she viewed things. One thing I had not mentioned before when you were asking me about my profession, is that when I circled back for my first job being in science, I also came back to science again later on, when I did go to graduate school with science.

IG: 36:35
In science?

GG: 36:36
Yeah, I have a master's degree in molecular biology, and I have worked at NIH for many years. I am now retired from it, so I science has won me over in the end.

IG: 36:52
And so, so when did you when did you make that decision to go into-

GG: 36:58
After our children were starting elementary school, I went back to graduate school.

IG: 37:03
I see.

GG: 37:04
I went to graduates school.

IG: 37:07
Wonderful.

PG: 37:07
Tell the story of the course you took at UCLA,

GG: 37:11
Oh UCLA, yeah, yeah, yeah,

IG: 37:13
UCLA?

GG: 37:15
Yeah. We were in-

IG: 37:16
Los Angeles.

PG: 37:17
Yeah. Actually, I had joined the RAND Corporation, and said volunteer to in Washington, but it volunteered to spend a year in Santa Monica. So, the family did that. And so that is why we were in Los Angeles, and Gail took a course.

IG: 37:37
When were you in Los Angeles?

PG: 37:38
(19)84, (19)85.

IG: 37:38
(19)84, (19)85.

GG: 37:41
Yeah. And you know, when you are home with two young children, the only thing you keep hearing is the dripping away of all your [inaudible]. So, I was always looking for something that would be sort of an intellectual stimulus. As much as I loved being home with my kids, you just cannot do it 100 percent there is no one normal. And so, I-

PG: 38:08
Of course, they were both in school.

GG: 38:10
Yeah, and so I was able to take a course. I actually took it at night, so it just did not matter about their school schedule. And it was just eye opening because I began to see the whole field of molecular biology had started up in the interim, and whereas biology before was just constant memorization, classification and structural and physiology stuff, and I did not find that that compelling, which is why I was more attracted to chemistry, because it is a little bit more overview general approaches. But molecular biology was chemistry brought to biology. And so that is so it suddenly opened my eyes. I said I could do this. This is like,

IG: 38:56
What, why do you think that the field opened up because of the advent of technology?

GG: 39:05
There are tipping points in every field where you get new techniques that come up that suddenly allow people to have insight in areas, they never had access to before. And so, it was the early work of the bacteriologists and they were beginning to understand and manipulate the genes in that simple bacteria and be able to show how it- they created a whole metabolism chart, and the early work of the nutritionist in biochemistry opened up this field. That opened it up in biochemistry, but the biochemists really added, brought this whole dimension and to into biology. And then when you couple that with sequencing and the understanding of DNA, which was not well elucidated. Back when I was in college, you knew that it existed, but there was so much that you did not know that allowed manipulations with it and that just-just broke open the door.

IG: 40:15
So-so in your job at the NIH what-what was your focus? What-what did you do?

GG: 40:23
Well, I worked for in graduate school, there with a bacteriologist, geneticist, and then after I finished graduate school, I-I had a full-time position, got a full-time position for about, I guess, about seven, eight years, maybe eight years, I was in Alan's lab, and it was a basic science lab. I worked in a small model organism called dictyostelium discoid, and we studied aspects of signal transduction, which is just, how do you how does this organism take surface signals and have create changes inside and-

IG: 41:11
Just explain for the audience, why is understanding signaling so important to biochemistry?

GG: 41:25
Oh, well, it is very in some ways we never knew. Part of it is playing around and experimenting. But the theory was that if we understood how we could manipulate signals on the surface, which could be anything like a drug can come in and clog up a pathway, but being able to understand the internal workings of the cell, you- they were, it was very reductionist in those days, so they were really trying to, we were really trying to understand how a cell actually works. And we thought with something very simple, you could understand, in this case, how do these cells begin to move from being single cells to aggregating with other single cells and become, and in fact, a whole new organism and the fruiting body and make a complete transformation and this organism. If we could understand this, how this organism works, well, maybe would understand how tumors come together, or other aspects that have relate to human disease or human function. So that is part of that makes sense.

IG: 42:42
Fascinating. Yes-yes.

PG: 42:44
Irene, just, I just love to talk. I am sorry, watch, and I realized this joint interview is not working for me, because I have to be, you know, on-on a call.

IG: 42:54
When?

PG: 42:55
4:30.

IG: 42:55
Or. okay, all right, so let us focus on you. [crosstalk] Actually, I am- I found it very interesting what you had to say, and I had some exposure to what you were describing. I am sorry. So, Paul, tell us about your work for the just-just the evolution of your career. You worked at the RAND, you worked at you were working currently at the Brookings Institute. So, tell us, tell us, you know the progression this-

PG: 43:41
Oh sure.

IG: 43:41
Yes.

PG: 43:42
Yes. Well, actually, when I had finished, when I was in graduate school, I became very interested in policy. Actually, I got into healthcare in graduate school, an interesting route of finishing coursework, not being ready to start a thesis and working for a consulting firm which sent me to Nova Scotia to help the provincial governments technical assistance. I won't get into what it was for, but that changed my interests and decided I wanted to do something and applied micro economics, and chose health because that was one of the two areas that Harvard was very strong in. So-so anyway, I started pursuing health care as I was preparing to write a dissertation. Got a dissertation topic in healthcare, and then was going to go into policy. Actually, had a job with the New York City governments. Very attractive job, which I thought that would be a. Was suitable for a draft deferral. Turned out not to be. So, I was found by an enterprising person that in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, it was named then-

IG: 45:15
In New York?

PG: 45:16
No in Washington, who you know, had realized that he could use commissioned officers in the Public Health Service interchangeably with regular civil servants. And had recruited, when I was there, about 30 men who were there with two-year commissions.

IG: 45:41
Right.

PG: 45:43
So that is what I did. Basically, I was- it was doing program officer work which I did not particularly care for, which led me to decide, well, you know, you did not think you wanted to become an academic, but if you this would be the time to do it. So, then I went to Michigan State as an assistant professor there.

IG: 46:16
What year was that in the-

PG: 46:20
That was 1972 and was reasonably happy there, but not that engaged and was recruited by Duke, which seemed like a more exciting place. It was.

IG: 46:37
It was.

PG: 46:37
But it was not enough.

IG: 46:38
It was not enough.

PG: 46:40
So, I took a leave from Duke to join the Congressional Budget Office-

IG: 46:47
Oh, wow.

PG: 46:48
-which was willing to hire me into a permanent job rather than a visitor.

IG: 46:53
Right.

PG: 46:55
Knowing I was on leave from the University, and I never went back.

IG: 47:02
So, the Congressional Budget Office. What was so exciting- I mean, apart from being in the thick of things?

PG: 47:09
Being in the thick of things, you know, doing work that you know, congressional committee staff thought that they needed- as and, you know, being in the policy world.

IG: 47:27
So, so just feeling that you have a direct impact on the course of politics?

PG: 47:34
Policy.

IG: 47:35
Policy.

PG: 47:36
That is right.

IG: 47:37
So, what- so-so just give us, you know, some of the highlights of your career. I mean, what, what policies did you create that came to. came to light, came to materialize, and what, what effect did they have on launching?

PG: 48:02
It was probably best to say policies I was involved in developing, and not claim credit for the policies these change in the way Medicare paid hospitals. That was probably the most impactful thing during my CBO days. There were other policies that I had a role in at later jobs.

IG: 48:27
In later jobs.

PG: 48:30
In later jobs.

IG: 48:31
So how long were you at the Congressional Budget Office?

PG: 48:34
Six years.

IG: 48:35
Six years. That is from 197-

PG: 48:39
8 to 1984.

IG: 48:43
And then what happened?

PG: 48:48
Yes, and then I actually started getting bored there. Joined the RAND Corporation, which is a think tank.

IG: 48:58
I know, I know.

PG: 48:59
Yeah, you know, started, you know, to doing analysis for the Air Force, but with a significant domestic program, particularly in health care.

IG: 49:10
Particularly?

PG: 49:10
In health care.

IG: 49:11
In health care, where the Air Force?

PG: 49:16
Yeah, there was- Rand was actually initiated by the Air Force.

IG: 49:24
So-

PG: 49:25
In the 1940s.

IG: 49:26
In the 1940s. I did not know that. I lived in Los Angeles. I worked for a university. So of course, you know, but I did not know the Air Force origins. So, you were there for a year?

PG: 49:42
Well, I was with Rand for two years. You know, one was in Santa Monica and one was in Washington. And then a congressional Commission was created where Congress wanted, uh, set up a commission to come up with a policy to revamp physician payments in the Medicare program, and I was recruited to be executive director of that commission. Easiest job decision ever to do that so-so that is what I did, starting in 1986.

IG: 50:33
So revamped physician payment?

PG: 50:36
Payments in Medicare.

IG: 50:37
So, did this, did this revision benefit physicians or patients?

PG: 50:47
Well, hopefully both, but it was, it benefited some physicians at the expense of other physicians. It just changed the structure of payments as to rewarding visits more highly than procedures, whether I doubt it affected patients that much, except very indirectly. And so that was the commission was very successful because Congress enacted legislation based on the commission's proposals in 1989 and which still functions to this day, so does the hospital payment system.

IG: 51:45
So, you actually had a hand in creating policies for-

PG: 51:51
Yes, for physician payments.

IG: 51:54
That is right for hospital.

PG: 51:55
I mentioned the hospital before

IG: 51:58
Yes.

PG: 51:59
That was when I was at CBO, I had a bigger influence on the physician payment because of actually drawing up the proposal.

IG: 52:18
So, we have either you to thank or-

PG: 52:22
That is right [crosstalk]. That was a role.

IG: 52:27
Yeah.

PG: 52:28
Then [crosstalk] I was Medicare, yeah, that was all Medicare. But, yeah, but Medicare, what we did, influenced the rest of the payment system immediately, almost. Then I started a think tank at the invitation to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

IG: 52:49
Oh wow. [inaudible]

PG: 52:54
The Center for Studying Health System change.

IG: 52:57
That is tremendous. So, tell us about this work.

PG: 53:09
Yes, well, that actually involved extensive data collection. The vision on the part of the foundation for this was that this was when President Clinton and Hillary Clinton were, you know, developing a proposal to reform the health care system, which today sometimes referred to as Hillary care. And there was concern that the federal government was not adequately prepared to monitor how healthcare was changing under that reform, and it wanted to fund research to augment what the federal government would-would be doing. Now, of course, the reform did not pass, but the Foundation decided to go forward anyway, because it perceived the health care system on its own was changing very quickly.

IG: 54:19
Just-just expand on that last point so, um-

PG: 54:24
Well, there were new organizations being created, right new types of physician organizations. Hospitals were acquiring other hospitals and insurance products were changing. So, there was, you know, with managed care was becoming very important. So that was the motivation. And this think tank, the center, you know, conducted surveys of households and physicians. And-and but what it was best known for was conducting extensive site visits in 12 representative metropolitan areas involved interviewing leaders, and, you know, different sectors of the healthcare system and-and sectors that interacted with the health care system, like employers.

IG: 55:28
So, which-which health care systems did you interview?

PG: 55:36
Well, so-so in a typical-

IG: 55:37
Several-several.

PG: 55:38
-market it would be, you know, maybe two or three hospitals, if there were physician organizations, either multi-specialty groups or what was called an Independent Practice Association, they were interviewed insurance companies--I mean health insurance companies. What else the state Medicaid program advocates for-for health care for the poor. We interviewed local journalists who covered health care.

IG: 56:18
The Wall Street Journal or?

PG: 56:19
No, local journalists.

IG: 56:20
Local journalists.

PG: 56:21
You know what, journalists with the local newspaper that were the healthcare specialists.

IG: 56:31
So, what were- what was the result of these findings in terms of change in direction of-

PG: 56:43
Well, I think people-people understood what was going on in the healthcare system a lot better than they had before.

IG: 56:51
Yeah.

PG: 56:51
You know, I cannot point to something that they did because they were better informed. Interestingly, there was a lot always interest in those 12 sites, those 12 metropolitan areas, in finding out how they were different from other places around the country.

IG: 57:13
So, these findings came to light in which form, you know-

PG: 57:19
In numerous-

IG: 57:21
I am not familiar with the world of Washington or policy making and so yeah.

PG: 57:27
And numerous publications.

IG: 57:29
Yes, numerous publications, so-

PG: 57:31
Publications and media interviews. Well, I mean many of the publications, some were articles in peer reviewed journals like health affairs or the New England Journal of Medicine. Many were just, you know, issue briefs, research briefs, published on our website.

PG: 57:51
And they had a very big list. You had a very big-

PG: 57:55
Oh yeah, you know, 10,000 people, you know, received emails when new publications were released.

IG: 58:06
So, you know who accessed this- what kind of people accessed this information?

PG: 58:13
Well, I would say both people, state, federal policy, worlds, people in industry.

IG: 58:20
Right.

PG: 58:20
You know, hospital executives, insurance executives, you know, physician groups. They were the audience. We did not write them for the general public.

IG: 58:31
Yeah.

GG: 58:32
But they were available.

PG: 58:33
They were available. Yeah.

IG: 58:35
Does it does- are you still continuing this work?

PG: 58:39
No-no. The um- well, you know, the- this function for 19 years, which is a very long time for foundation funded activities, and just the funding could not be sustained. And so, I left in the end of 2013. And became a faculty member at the University of Southern California.

IG: 59:12
Oh, that is where I worked, the library faculty. Beginning library faculty.

PG: 59:17
I see, yeah. So, I was at the public and still am at the public policy school. But living here.

IG: 59:26
You were living here so, but you shuttle back and forth.

PG: 59:30
Well, not a lot I do, I do some teaching there, some teaching online.

IG: 59:34
I see, I see, I see.

PG: 59:36
And I am part of a research group. And you know, these days, you do not need to be physically there.

IG: 59:41
It is a great school. I was there in the early (19)90s, and it already was acquiring a reputation of becoming the NYU of the West. It was no longer thought of as the university of the spoiled children. [laughter]I could see us, but it has a fantastic music school, fantastic linguistics. I mean, these are [crosstalk]

PG: 1:00:11
Yeah, it is very hard to get in these days.

IG: 1:00:13
Very-very.

PG: 1:00:14
Undergraduates, at least, yeah, so that, so I joined that faculty, and two years ago, the actually a wealthy individual who had actually been instrumental in setting up the Economics and Policy Center I was affiliated with, called the Schaeffer Center for-for Health Policy and Economics. The Mr. Schaefer wanted to create a partnership between the Schaeffer Center at USC and Brookings, and so that is what led me to come to Brookings, to lead that partnership from Brookings.

IG: 1:01:14
So, what-what is now the focus of your work?

PG: 1:01:18
It is all on analyzing and developing health policies, health policies. So, I have done a number of different things.

IG: 1:01:36
Oh yes. I mean, it is a stellar career.

PG: 1:01:38
But that is doing different things, rather than contrast to my father and brother, each of whom had one job in their lives-

IG: 1:01:46
Yes.

PG: 1:01:49
-changes, I get bored with things.

IG: 1:01:51
Right. I understand, but you and your wife-

PG: 1:01:56
With everything except women.

IG: 1:01:59
Let us, let us, let us just talk about this for the few minutes that you ever meet. So how did you meet your wife?

PG: 1:02:08
I do not know exactly, but I was a senior. I was a senior, and she was a freshman at-at Harpur, and it was maybe about halfway through that year.

GG: 1:02:23
I do not know exactly either. Most people have a certain date. So, we just, we met sometime, I think maybe spring.

PG: 1:02:35
Yeah, probably, I mean, probably the spring semester.

GG: 1:02:37
Yeah, he graduated, but then he was in Boston, and I was still at Harpur, and it was not quite so easy in those days to stay in touch. You could, if you but we did not know each other that much that deeply at that point, so I guess we did not. We stopped dating at that point. And then when I moved to Boston after college. We met again.

PG: 1:03:03
Yes, that is three years later.

GG: 1:03:05
Yeah, and then we got married within the year, yeah, six months or something like that. Because, in a sense, I kind of knew him. I just-just when we had moved to Boston, my roommate and I, we just assumed he was married, but we knew he would know the area. We both knew him a little bit, and so I would just ring him up and-and he was not in town, but he when he came back, he contacted me, and we started dating.

IG: 1:03:41
And you discovered that he was not married.

GG: 1:03:43
Yeah [laughter] That was even better.

PG: 1:03:46
And ironically, this is when I had mentioned that not ready to start a thesis, I was working for a consulting firm and was in Nova Scotia. That is when she contacted me, when I was in Nova Scotia, but when I came back

IG: 1:04:00
And you were happy that she contacted.

PG: 1:04:02
Yes.

IG: 1:04:04
What did you think of Gail at the time? What was she like? Was she the same person that she is now? I mean, some essence of her probably.

PG: 1:04:13
Oh, of course, yes.

IG: 1:04:15
So, was she the same person? How has she changed? Do you think-

PG: 1:04:20
No one has ever asked me that. I mean, I am essentially the same person. Yeah, of course, she has changed.

IG: 1:04:31
Yes. How about you? What-what-what-what would your classmates say about you from the time of Harpur College? Could they have predicted that you would have the major career that you did?

PG: 1:04:47
Well, I was a good student there, at least for the last two plus years and but I do not know what they would have could have predicted.

GG: 1:04:58
He is so understated. He was, like number two in the class. He was the top econ student. And Paul would say this, but I can say it.

PG: 1:05:12
But in a sense, actually, what maybe-maybe people would be surprised by, and maybe they would not be, because, say, as a top student going to Harvard, they would have thought, oh, he will be a famous professor, and that is not the career I did.

GG: 1:05:31
Paul was ahead. It is sort of in the vanguard of academic people who began to do more practical work than applied work. Academics tend to look down in almost irrespective one, well, maybe philosophy, but-

IG: 1:05:49
No, I know the syndrome.

GG: 1:05:51
Yeah, and Paul was really brave when he did not mention this. But when he left Duke, did not take his two-year leave every single close friend of his in academia said, "Do not do that and do not leave it. Do not leave academia." And when he was thinking of leaving, he had no support from his friends, really. He had a lot of support from his wife, because happy he was, but and then as far as I was concerned, that is all they counted. But the- but I felt that it was kind of a brave step. May not sound so brave looking back now, but at the time, it was a big deal to be someone who had the academic credentials to be a tenured professor at such a young age at Duke. He was really good and-and he just did not like it. He did not thrive in the environment. And he was wise enough, and we were all supportive enough of him to say.

IG: 1:06:54
And this was in what just remind me what the years were.

GG: 1:06:58
I do not know. you remember.

PG: 1:06:59
That was probably 1978.

IG: 1:07:00
1978.

PG: 1:07:01
Yes, it is actually so I would say that my peers would have expected me to have a successful career. But I think only the ones that perhaps knew me really well might have imagined anything like the course it took.

IG: 1:07:21
Well, I mean-

PG: 1:07:22
In fact, they would have been very difficult, even for people that certainly I did not know,

IG: 1:07:26
You did not know. How could they have.

PG: 1:07:28
Yes, how could they have only, I am just saying think there is room for a very wise person.

IG: 1:07:33
Yes-yes. There is always room for a very wise observing person.

PG: 1:07:38
That is right. Actually, I will have to ask, we are actually, in a month from now, seeing an old friend from Harpur in New York, and we will have to ask him how surprised, how surprised he was. He was my roommate, friend a year or two.

IG: 1:07:57
It is 4:30 if you have to do this.

PG: 1:08:01
Yeah. I-

IG: 1:08:02
I will. I would like to continue a little bit with Gail.

PG: 1:08:05
Sure. Okay, I [crosstalk]

IG: 1:08:06
If you- absolutely we can go on if you have time. But-

PG: 1:08:10
Actually, I could spend another five or 10 minutes.

IG: 1:08:13
Okay, all right. Well, yes-

IG: 1:08:16
That is great. I have, I have-

GG: 1:08:17
My schedule is flexible.

IG: 1:08:18
Yeah, mine is too. My daughter is coming at eight, so I am not going to be here until 8. [laughs]. Okay, so more about you know, Gail and did you feel that during the during your time that the expectations for women students were different than they were for you know- so, you know, people had no problem predicting that Paul would have, you know, the stellar career, but did they have the same expectations for women students, although these were exceptional women students.

GG: 1:09:01
It is an interesting question. I think that the university, there were many things about Binghamton University that I really did not care for. I found like little provincial and I felt isolated. I did not- I actually would have been more comfortable in a larger university, and I never realized that about myself. That is not Binghamton fault. That was right. That is just something you learn about yourself. But I would say that the academic environment was too theoretical in almost all disciplines, no matter what subject matter you picked, they took the theoretical perspective. You know, people moaned over the fact that the psych department only was experimental psych, no clinical. And I-

IG: 1:09:57
The other day, I heard, said that, um, the clinical side was experimenting on mice.

PG: 1:10:05
Yeah, well, that is what she means by experimental. Experimental means with my clinical-

IG: 1:10:11
Those are the wet labs. Those are the- so I see.

GG: 1:10:15
Yeah, and that. And when I started my math, unlike Paul, who had actually a more practical calculus course, I was hit with theoretical calculus from day one and it was like way over my head. Actually, would not have been over my head if I actually applied myself. But-

PG: 1:10:33
You know, I was thinking about that my professor for math. It was his textbook that he used in my class. [laughs]

GG: 1:10:40
I remember when I met Paul, he said, "Oh, you should use this textbook, because it will explain it so much better." But anyway, I would say that the academic environment was very welcoming, and it did not matter that I was a woman, I felt, I thought I had lots of opportunities within the university environment. After all, I was doing these sketches, there was another person who was also capable of those sketches, but I got to do them, and he was the other one was a fellow. I never felt discriminated against as a woman, and I know I was sensitive to it because of my mom, who was always pointing out inequities, and I went to an all-girls high school, a magnet school in Manhattan. And-

IG: 1:11:29
Where did you go?

GG: 1:11:30
Hunter College High School. And so, I would say that I was somewhat primed, even though I do not think I am a strident or feminist. I cannot say I have noticed anything. And I would say that I was also very lucky in my career that I have always had male mentors who did not hit on me. They were great people. They were- it was almost like father figures more. It is kind of the way you think it should be-

IG: 1:12:03
Yeah.

GG: 1:12:04
and I-

IG: 1:12:04
Very lucky.

GG: 1:12:05
I think I have been. I do not know whether it is I am so-so used to dealing with I had a lot of male cousins; I and I had a lot of male friends growing up, I was kind of a tomboy, and so maybe I just interact with men in a different way.

IG: 1:12:22
In a different way.

GG: 1:12:22
But whatever it is, I never felt discriminated against. What I did feel is that I thought that there was a lot out there in the world that had sort of institutionalized sexism more-

IG: 1:12:39
Such as such as your first job out of college, being secretary. You went on-

GG: 1:12:44
I was not sure that my professors could help me break into the chemistry lab, maybe, but I did not think so. And I was right on-

PG: 1:12:52
I had this perception of college. I did not expect that the women were going to just get married and stay home. I do not think many of the women in my class got married when they graduated. Most of them got work of some sorts, and that may have been, you know, distinct from, say, a lot of other colleges.

GG: 1:13:18
Yeah, a fair number of women, maybe-maybe the women, you know. But I thought there were quite a few in my year that married. After we-we married, not that soon after I finished college, really.

PG: 1:13:30
Yeah. Well, three, four years after.

GG: 1:13:34
No.

IG: 1:13:35
Oh yeah, that is right.

GG: 1:13:36
Nine months.

PG: 1:13:37
Yeah.

IG: 1:13:38
I mean, you were also, especially your generation was going, I mean, you were the same generation, but your graduating class, this was the time of Woodstock, of a lot of the youth culture and the rebellion of the new youth culture.

PG: 1:13:57
I should probably go now. Thank you very much, Irene.

IG: 1:13:59
Thank you.

PG: 1:14:00
Enjoy.

GG: 1:14:04
Thank you. One thing I would have to say is one of my biggest support in anything that I have done since I met him was Paul. He never, ever held me back in any way, he was always supportive, so maybe because he thought it would be much worse, leaving me frustrated at home. [laughs] I do not know. He is not self-serving, so it is just, if he would just take over child care. He was not much of a cook, but he could reheat things, and the kids used to call him the king of reheating. But he was always there to support whatever I had to do, whatever I had a class or something to go to, no problem.

IG: 1:14:59
So, it maybe you know more a question of you know his particular personality and-

GG: 1:15:09
[crosstalk]

IG: 1:15:09
and his family background.

GG: 1:15:12
His father jumped in and helped out too.

IG: 1:15:15
It was less patriarchal. Do you or not at all- do you remember the (19)60s climate of, you know, rebelliousness, of drug, sex and rock and roll, of questioning everything, fighting the man. Did that have any impact? Or were you-

GG: 1:15:39
Much more on me-

IG: 1:15:40
Yes.

GG: 1:15:41
-then Paul, because graduating in (19)68 was already seemed like the height of it. The beginning of the red wave. Certainly, there was much more political activity at that point than I remembered when I first started college.

IG: 1:15:57
Yes.

GG: 1:15:58
And-and I was not in the forefront of these movements. I never did drugs. I can be ditzy enough without drugs or alcohol. I can do that all on my own. And I have never had a taste for alcohol and-and I really did not like smoke that much so, but I had a lot of friends who were deep into marijuana culture. I am one of these people. I tend to have people friends from all walks of life. Is funny. I still have evangelical friends and I have socialist friends.

IG: 1:16:42
Because you were comfortable with these different political uh-

GG: 1:16:47
I guess so. I am always interested in what people how they come to these decisions, what drives them. What motivates them. And sometimes they are very nice people, even who do not agree with their political perspective. The Vietnam War was horrible. It started to come home to us more and more. You were a little isolated from it on campus, because in those days, there was like one television in-in each dorm, I think in the lobby area there would be a television, but you did not really get all that news. I did not, I do not think I even got a newspaper when I was in college, so I felt actually more isolated from the world than when I was living at home, where I would see newspapers and read them each day and but still, the news eventually came on campus, and Harpur was, I think, on the early side of these activities, I come from Staten Island, which was, you know, a great draft board. As far as recruiting for the army, a lot of people, a lot of people signed up for service. I know a lot of the names on that wall on the mall. I feel bad the people I went to elementary school with gone for what no purpose. What I think I missed in college was the beginnings of the feminist movement that seemed to my younger cousins kind of bring me into that more.

IG: 1:18:25
But did not that beginnings, I mean, did not it kind of start in the very early (19)70s, or?

GG: 1:18:32
I think it did. I think that is what I mean. I think so it was after.

IG: 1:18:36
Right-right.

GG: 1:18:37
And the same with civil rights. I seem to be a little bit more after my college years. So, I became aware of it just more through reading papers and being back into the real world.

IG: 1:18:51
Right-right-right. Were there any students of color that you remember?

IG: 1:18:57
Oh, yeah.

GG: 1:18:58
Yeah. One of my objections to Harpur is I was accustomed to more diverse student body, and Harpur was the first time I was at a place where it seemed like everyone was Jewish, and I had not been, you know, that familiar with that uniform culture. It was interesting. But they- I think the last year, year and a half, there was more of an attempt to increase diversity. And there were a number of students that came on who were of African American descent, mostly as I recall. I do not think Hispanic or Asian. I do not recall seeing, and actually, I became friendly with some of the people in the program. It was pretty tough on them. They really stood out like sore thumbs. It would not have been as- it would have been a lot easier in a place that had more diversity to begin with. And I-I just know I had some friends who dated fellas in that program, and they got a lot of static in those days. This was interesting. The good friend who was started dating an African American who started to come to the university, and she said to me, you know, all these really liberal people who are out, you know, raging against the war and this and that, the other said they are just as racist as anyone else. And I trusted what she was saying. That was her experience. It was the comments she received and because she was dating someone who was different.

IG: 1:18:58
Yeah.

IG: 1:20:48
yeah, I think she probably was right.

GG: 1:20:51
I am sure she was but frankly, you know, my parents were not ecstatic about Paul being Jewish.

IG: 1:20:59
Yeah.

GG: 1:20:59
So, I have seen it from the other side. But then when they really met Paul, they loved him. So sometimes you just have to get to know people.

IG: 1:21:11
I think so. I think it is I agree, I agree. I think it is a question of exposure. And, uh-

GG: 1:21:18
Yeah. So Harpur did not really have a diverse environment. Most days it was uni, fairly liberal, which was more than I was, more liberal than I had seen before. So, I found it that part interesting.

IG: 1:21:34
Right-right. So, you know, I am just, you know, you said a lot of very interesting things, that you were given a theoretical education. You know, you were given a theoretical- you were given validation, you know, both as a scientist, as a student of literature, as an artist. Do you think you would have had this opportunity, you know, at another school, at a larger school? I mean, it is too theoretical to say, but you know-

GG: 1:22:17
Actually, it is not, because I have my graduate school experience too. There is something about me that I the way, I guess I interact with people or whatever, I have never lacked for support or for mentors, and they just come out of the woodwork. And I do not know how it happens, but I am really lucky that way, I, for example, took to cut down my commute to graduate school. Actually, took some courses, biochemistry courses over at NIH, they had that evening program, and my university was willing to accept the credits. And it just turned out, you know, I think it is because I would stop stay after class and ask questions, and I became friendly with the professors of the course, and that is how I got my job at NIH. Go figure you cannot plan on it.

IG: 1:23:17
No, you cannot.

GG: 1:23:17
You just cannot plan on happening. But that is exactly how my career has always unfolded. I just have these opportunities fall in front of me, and I take them.

IG: 1:23:33
Give us another example.

GG: 1:23:38
I think, well, when I was a great graduate student. I-I got a first I started by getting an internship. I got a summer I got a summer internship at a really wonderful lab at NIH, directly from my biochemistry class, they had said, you know, this guy is really good, and he could use someone for the summer. So, I went and talked with him and-and then from there, the fellow who was my mentor at that lab, who unfortunately has passed away, Howard. He went. He met my son, who at that time was a budding computer scientist, but he just and mathematician and everything that he has become. And Howard just went to a meeting and said, "You know, I know about this really young kid. He was too young to really take a job, but he would be great for anyone who needs blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." And Adam got a summer internship at NIH too.

IG: 1:24:59
Right. [crosstalk] but, you know, part of it is being an insider already, and that that sort of exposes you to the opportunities. You know, it is, I mean, if you were coming out, if you were coming cold, into this, it would have been maybe a more difficult proposition, but you were already in the mix.

GG: 1:25:22
Yeah, but they were you know-

IG: 1:25:24
[crosstalk] of course.

GG: 1:25:25
I was in that class. But [crosstalk] who got-

IG: 1:25:29
No but it is but you were, you were the one who was chosen. So-

GG: 1:25:33
Yeah, so I was, I always felt like I was fortunate that way.

IG: 1:25:37
Yeah.

GG: 1:25:40
It is another way. Oh, I know, I had a brief interlude before I went into bio, molecular biology. I spent some time, felt a had a degree in audiology, and I worked for a while there, thinking this would be a very easy kind of time work. You know, I could do that handling with the family and blah, blah, blah, and I did not. I had underestimated just how boring it was. So, I became interested in, I became friendly with the neurologists and the rehab center where I worked, and they would invite me to come in, and we would autopsies of some of the patient. Oh, this is very little gross for some people, but for some of the patients where I had helped with the diagnosis, the- they would invite me to come and see what the physical brain looked like. They were dissecting. They were trying to better understand what was the cause of the problem. There is a lot that you cannot do neurologically.

IG: 1:26:51
There is what?

GG: 1:26:52
A lot that about neuroanatomy and neurology. It is not well understood even today, no less back then. And so, then that led me to take a neuroanatomy course in the medical school, and I got the top grade in the class on the exam. And the professor did not know who I was, so he held back giving the- he was giving out all the papers, and he held mine for last because he wanted to see who I was.

IG: 1:27:28
So that is, well, I mean, it is, it is obviously, you know, it is talent, and I think, you know, kind of an open mindedness and

GG: 1:27:39
Curiosity, yeah, I am much less disciplined than Paul. Paul is, like, really a good student. I am a good student if I am interested and if I am not interested well [crosstalk]

IG: 1:27:53
But it seems that he gets he gets forward very quickly. So, he-

GG: 1:27:56
He does.

IG: 1:27:57
He tackles a problem, and then he moves on.

GG: 1:28:00
Yeah, he gets restless.

IG: 1:28:01
Yeah.

GG: 1:28:02
The Seven Year Itch, always Yeah. So, I guess I get restless too. But I was really particularly one of the things I used to really like about working at NIH and I switched from the lab into infectious disease program grants work. Um, and again, because a friend of mine, a clinical fellow who worked in the lab where I worked, we just became friendly, and she had moved over to this position, and then she had an opportunity to recruit me. So, I interviewed, and I was accepted for the job the- but so I became started to get into, back into clinical work and but really using my research background to help with understand the science and help people with their grants. And so, some of it was very administrative. Some of it was program development.

IG: 1:29:10
I think that is fascinating. The program development aspect, I think would be very interesting. Did you find it?

GG: 1:29:16
I did, yeah, I liked it a lot. I actually ran a US Japan program.

IG: 1:29:24
A what?

GG: 1:29:26
A US Japan program?

IG: 1:29:27
A US Japan, I just did not hear so-

GG: 1:29:29
Infection in mycobacterial research. So, the diseases of tuberculosis and leprosy, they are bigger public health issues in Asia, and certainly, when the program was started, they were much bigger. These diseases are, you know, are treated by have drug treatments now that kind of help that they help quite a bit, especially with leprosy, TB still [inaudible] problem. But anyway, yeah, there are programs like that that you can run. I had a lot of there are big projects that we conceive of. We put out an announcement things. Group gets funded, and then I have to have oversight over that project. I started to become the specialist in diagnostics for mycobacterial diseases, and that was very interesting, because it tied in my whole background with small business, because it was actually the small business programs where most of the diagnostics applications were coming in from, and we had noticed-

IG: 1:30:48
Please explain that.

GG: 1:30:50
Well, NIH has set aside has is required by Congress, and much of the federal government is required by Congress to set aside a certain amount of funding. It is actually a percent of your funds that you receive from Congress have to be set aside and used for small business projects to stimulate small businesses to support their work science. So, these are small businesses that are often offshoots of academic work. Someone from a university has built a patent on something they, on the side, develop a small business, have a few students or people work for them. They put in applications through the small business program. And there are, there is a limit to the type of project that you can do in a small setting like that. And it turns out that diagnostics is a very good approach for small business. It is something you can actually make money on. Have a product that you ultimately sell to a big company, and it is very doable.

IG: 1:31:59
Such as I remember reading about a battery size sensor that can diagnose a range of diseases from your breath. It is like-

GG: 1:32:16
Yeah, breathalyzer.

IG: 1:32:17
Breathalyzer.

GG: 1:32:18
Yeah, even though the scientist [crosstalk]

IG: 1:32:20
Yeah, really who is the scientist?

GG: 1:32:22
Michael Phillips is one of the one of these developers, I think he has a compassionate use approval from FDA for his using heart rejection,

IG: 1:32:36
Yeah, for multiple purposes, I think.

GG: 1:32:40
He was trying for lung cancer, if for TB, it has been a little [inaudible]. I do not know how his work-

IG: 1:32:47
That is right. And the idea of these breathalyzers is that they could be easily used by people in under developed countries where there is no not, not as much theories too. That is a theory. But in reality, that does not work well.

GG: 1:33:03
In reality, the world is more complex.

IG: 1:33:06
Of course.

GG: 1:33:07
Yeah. So, you can get a lot of anomalies that your equipment picks up, too, especially if you are in an area where this is disease is common, and everyone has that. So, there is a lot of it floating around in the air. I see you have to be sure you are picking up something that is specific from that person. And you do not know if that, and there are a lot of technical aspects, but in theory, it has a lot of potential. There is potential for blood tests running able to help. It was, it was a perfect program for me, and everyone began to realize that, and they were sending all the people to me, so I became the go to person at our Institute for small business projects in mycobacterial diseases.

IG: 1:33:58
That is, that is fantastic.

GG: 1:34:00
Yeah. So, I started out as a literature major, but anyway, well, life evolved.

IG: 1:34:08
So, are you still in touch with your Binghamton classmates? Any of them? Or do you have any?

GG: 1:34:18
I was in touch with three people from school. Unfortunately, two of them have passed away, and the third one I have kind of fallen out with. I do not see her so much. I saw her up till about maybe five, six years ago, something like that, just off and on. But I think the ones that I lost, I think were the ones that I was closest with, really, and that is unfortunate.

IG: 1:34:54
So-so, you know, I think that you. We are kind of coming to sort of a natural end, unless you know, so-so-so you know, some of the things that I some of the concluding questions that I ask my interview is, so what-what you know, life lessons you could you impart to current and future students at Binghamton, what are the most important elements for success, for your success, that really have characterized your career

GG: 1:35:44
Well, I think starting out, especially if they are young, they should spend some time getting advice on how to tackle college. I think that there is advice given today that was not available at all when we were there. I think it would have helped some people. I am sure I would have benefited from some advice I learned somewhere between college and graduate school. I learned how to really focus and what was really needed in a classroom, academic setting. And so, I just went through those courses, breezed through them. I think that it would have been if I had just a little bit of advice on organizing and how to go about doing things. I think it would have helped me at that age, for sure. I think Paul stabilized me so much that by the time going through graduate school, it was really easy, even though we had two children at home, and I was handling that on top. I think the second thing though is I would really encourage people to reach out to professors and to reach out to the graduate students and try to engage in an intellectual life in college, because you- it is the one place where You can get an intellectual life, you cannot be guaranteed of it once you leave college. You know your next-door neighbors may be gun toting rednecks. They may be a lot of fun at a barbecue. But they are not going to help you on an intellectual life and-and I find that it can be hard at different points in your life. You really want to know what it feels like to use your brain and to think intellectually so that you can come back to it at different points in your life. If you have never experienced it in college, then when do you expect to and I think colleges should that is something. Our son went to Harvard as an undergraduate, and one of their strengths, they have a lot of weaknesses. It was great for him, but it was one of the strengths, is that they make this intellectual home at every dorm. They have an intellectual life that goes on, the graduate students and people who proctors, who are all part of stimulating intellectual life, and-and Harpur had some of that when we were there. We had people in the dorms, and there was a little bit of that stimulation. And they sometimes younger faculty would be in the dining hall, and you would get a chance to talk with them. Maybe I can get to know them really well. I think that is really important. I think that is something that colleges would strive for, and I think that students should expect and try to get out of college, because it-it then helps you come out into the adult world and-and interact with adults. And to have it-it raises your expectations out of life.

IG: 1:39:13
Yes, I think very well, very well, very well. put, very well put, you know, and it just gives you, it is so important to have an intellectual life, because it is part of the human experience that not everybody has an opportunity to-

GG: 1:39:34
Yeah, and if you are going to college, that is what you should be expecting, not a technical training.

IG: 1:39:41
Yeah, I agree. I agree. Any concluding remarks, anything?

GG: 1:39:49
That is fine. [laughs]

(End of Interview)

2018-03-12

Irene Gashurov

1965 and 1968

Dr. Paul Ginsburg and Gail Ginsburg

Paul Ginsburg, Ph.D. is the director, USC-Brookings Schaeffer Initiative for Health Policy and the Leonard D. Schaeffer Chair in Health Policy Studies, The Brookings Institution; and Professor of Health Policy and Director of Public Policy, Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics, University of Southern California. He also worked at the Rand Corporation, the Congressional Budget Office (1978-84), wrote policies that informed Hillary Clinton's health policy and founded the Center for Studying Health System Change.

Gail Ginsburg is a microbiologist with the grants office at the National Institutes of Health.

Audio

Harpur College – Sixties alumni; Harpur College – Alumni in higher education; Harpur College – Alumni in health policy; Harpur College – Alumni at University of Southern California; Harpur College – Alumni at the Brookings Institution; Harpur College – Alumni at the Rand Corporation; Harpur College – Alumni at the U.S. Congressional Budget Office; Harpur College – Alumni from New York City; Harpur College – Alumni living in the DC area; Harpur College – Alumni in medical research; Harpur College – Alumni at the National Institutes of Health

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Harpur College – Sixties alumni; Harpur College – Alumni in higher education; Harpur College – Alumni in health policy; Harpur College – Alumni at University of Southern California; Harpur College – Alumni at the Brookings Institution; Harpur College – Alumni at the Rand Corporation; Harpur College – Alumni at the U.S. Congressional Budget Office; Harpur College – Alumni from New York City; Harpur College – Alumni living in the DC area; Harpur College – Alumni in medical research; Harpur College – Alumni at the National Institutes of Health