Laffer curve dinner meeting at the Two Continents Restaurant in the Washington Hotel with Arthur Laffer, Wanniski, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and his deputy press secretary Grace-Marie Arnett. In this meeting, Laffer, arguing against President Gerald Ford's tax increase, reportedly sketched the curve on a napkin to illustrate the concept. Cheney did not accept the idea immediately, but it caught the imaginations of those present. Laffer professes no recollection of this napkin, but writes: "I used the so-called Laffer Curve all the time in my classes and with anyone else who would listen to me". There are historical precedents other than those
Laffer curve Jude Wanniski, who was also present at the meeting. The basic concept was not new; Laffer himself notes antecedents in the writings of the 14th-century social philosopher Ibn Khaldun and others. Laffer does not claim to have invented the concept; he notes that there are antecedents, including in the "Muqaddimah" by 14th-century Tunisian scholar Ibn Khaldun, and in the writings of John Maynard Keynes. It was not until the 1970s that Laffer's name began to be associated with the idea. The term "Laffer curve" was reportedly coined by Jude Wanniski (a writer for "The Wall Street Journal") after a 1974