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Economics is Hard. Don’t Let Bloggers Tell You Otherwise
scribd.com ^ | June 17, 2010 | Kartik Athreya

Posted on 07/03/2010 6:43:19 AM PDT by 1rudeboy

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To: Night Hides Not

Most of the profs speak English as a second language, poorly. One guy would write formulas on the board with his right hand while following with an eraser in his left.


21 posted on 07/03/2010 7:18:07 AM PDT by shove_it (old Old Guardsman)
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To: B Knotts
Economics is hard in this respect: the economy is too complex for anyone to fully understand it, and thus it is impossible to control it. So, government should just stop trying; cut taxes and get out of the way.

Bears repeating.

You are absolutely correct. In the 19th and early 20th it was possible for honorable and intelligent people to deceive themselves into believing they could "manage" the economy and make the world a better place.

The economy has since become orders of magnitude more complex and faster moving. Only a fool, an aspiring tyrant or someone intentionally deceiving himself could believe the same today.

It's like controlling the weather (or the climate). It's not just that we'd likely screw it up, it's that we don't have a clue how to go about doing it. If we would admit to ourselves that we don't have a clue, we just might possibly find one. Since we won't, we won't.

22 posted on 07/03/2010 7:22:48 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: newfreep
Keynesian economics ALWAYS fails. ALWAYS. Define "Keynesian economics."

Define "fails."

My point is that calling a particular policy "Keynesian" does not mean it is necessarily destined for failure.

And it is often possible to argue that even with a "failed" policy things might have been even worse without it.

23 posted on 07/03/2010 7:25:53 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: 1rudeboy

Eh? The one concept directly implies the other.


24 posted on 07/03/2010 7:26:13 AM PDT by SAJ
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To: Starboard
A handfull of technocrats in the government operate on the mistaken belief that they can make better decisions than that which is reflected in the collective wisdom of the judgements of hundreds of millions of people.

Also bears repeating.

25 posted on 07/03/2010 7:26:38 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: Starboard

Rxcellent book.


26 posted on 07/03/2010 7:26:56 AM PDT by mad_as_he$$ (Sometimes you have to go to dark places to get to the light....)
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To: 1rudeboy

One thing about economists... most are not business people and they do not understand business. Most would not be an economist if they knew how to make money in the business world. A few are truly sharp scientists but very few. Most “economists” quoted my the state run media are acaDemons... they know the least of all.

LLS


27 posted on 07/03/2010 7:29:10 AM PDT by LibLieSlayer ( WOLVERINES!)
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To: 1rudeboy

—took me a while to paste/format it for printing/reading; now for my coffee....


28 posted on 07/03/2010 7:29:15 AM PDT by expat_panama
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To: 1rudeboy
The fact that you are pontificating that the author is pontificating simply is icing on the cake.

I find your pontificating about my pontificating about the author's pontificating something to pontificate about.

29 posted on 07/03/2010 7:34:11 AM PDT by DaveyB (Fear is the foundation of most governments -- John Adams)
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To: 1rudeboy

That’s because they never read Hazlitt’s classic.

Go here for help:
http://www.amazon.com/Economics-One-Lesson-Henry-Hazlitt/dp/B001G8NW6Y/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1278167272&sr=8-2

Time for a a beer, another pressing problem solved.


30 posted on 07/03/2010 7:34:14 AM PDT by chickenlips
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To: chickenlips

Thanks for the link. Sounds like a good companion to Schiff’s book.


31 posted on 07/03/2010 7:42:09 AM PDT by Starboard
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To: SAJ; DaveyB

I just have the impression that neither of you bothered to read the essay.


32 posted on 07/03/2010 7:45:00 AM PDT by 1rudeboy
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To: Sherman Logan
Sorry, but if you need "Keynesian" defined exposes your lack of intelligence and common sense...or at best your passive defense of Keynesian.

History (and intellect) has ALWAYS shown Keynes as a failed economist and the politicians that follow his failed philosophy.

33 posted on 07/03/2010 7:49:01 AM PDT by newfreep (Palin/DeMint 2012 - Bolton: Secy of State)
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To: 1rudeboy
The real issue is that there is extremely low likelihood that the speculations of the untrained, on a topic almost pathologically riddled by dynamic considerations and feedback effects, will offer anything new. Moreover, there is a substantial likelihood that it will instead offer something incoherent or misleading. Note also that intelligence is not the issue. Many of those I am telling you not to listen to will more than successfully be able to match wits, in any generalized sense, with me. This is irrelevant. The question is: can they provide you, the reader, with an internally consistent analysis of a dynamic system subject to random shocks populated by thoughtful actors whose collective actions must be rendered feasible? For many questions, I and my colleagues can, and for those that the profession cannot, the blogging crowd probably can’t either.

Good grief! All he had to say was, "Economics follows Chaos Theory and therefore can't be explained" instead of four pages of Thesaurus use.

34 posted on 07/03/2010 7:50:15 AM PDT by raybbr (Someone who invades another country is NOT an immigrant - illegal or otherwise.)
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To: raybbr

He (or she?) has to spend a good deal of time heading-off the attacks you see above—”ivory tower intellectual,” “elitist,” and so forth.


35 posted on 07/03/2010 7:55:27 AM PDT by 1rudeboy
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To: mad_as_he$$

>>made deliberately hard by people in the trade

Pay no attention to the little men behind the curtain.

Ivory Tower A$$Hats like Athreya like to prop up the facade that the Proletariat needs a Vanguard Elite to “understand” (or not?) that fraud and blowing a derivative bubble by securitizing A$$Paper is bad.

Well, most of us simple folks (with common sense) don’t need a “Kartik Athreya” to understand the double entendre meaning of ESAD - one being a directive commonly uttered toward pompous twits like Athreya - the other meaning simply that if you do, you will.

Eat A$$Paper and Die, Athreya - if you do, you will. PLEASE DO!


36 posted on 07/03/2010 8:00:11 AM PDT by LomanBill (Animals! The DemocRats blew up the windmill with an Acorn!)
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To: newfreep

Great overview of Keynes, his core belief of Socialism and what his goals were...

John Maynard Keynes and Economic Fascism

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnUUMs9WIC0


37 posted on 07/03/2010 8:00:35 AM PDT by newfreep (Palin/DeMint 2012 - Bolton: Secy of State)
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To: LomanBill

You’re gonna’ have to ice that knee, it jerked so badly.


38 posted on 07/03/2010 8:01:24 AM PDT by 1rudeboy
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To: 1rudeboy

Eat A$$Paper and Die, little rude twit.


39 posted on 07/03/2010 8:03:57 AM PDT by LomanBill (Animals! The DemocRats blew up the windmill with an Acorn!)
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To: Don Corleone

Your example sounds like accounting, not economics.


40 posted on 07/03/2010 8:07:07 AM PDT by Toddsterpatriot (Math is hard. Harder if you're stupid.)
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