Quick Links, 10 May 2016
Kevin Drum discovers what I’ve been telling people for more than a decade.
Brad DeLong admits that the reason economists don’t know jack about economic growth is that their models don’t support it. There’s a reason Mankiw, Romer, and Weil (1992) is the most dangerous short-form piece of immature fiction since Atlas Shrugged.*
(Original source, at the bottom.)
Paul Campos notes how deeply Matt Yglesias is in the tank in attempting to portray Trump as rational.
Credit when due: Brad also noted that Robert’s recent AB post about being off the ZLB [now with link!] contains a bit of magical thinking. Robert’s response is well worth noting, as is ex-AB member PGL’s parry. Someone invite these guys to do a BloggingHeads.
*This is the long-form one.
The Onion does macro modeling :
“… I extend the two-period model to an infinite horizon and I show that it captures two features of real world capital markets. Price-earnings ratios are excessively volatile and equity earns a substantial premium over three month treasuries. These two features are related and they both follow from the inability of the unborn to trade in the financial markets. ”
http://rogerfarmerblog.blogspot.com/2016/05/would-robinson-crusoe-please-leave-stage.html
Oops , my bad. That’s Roger Farmer , not The Onion.
I guess since he hasn’t had much success in convincing the Fed to buy up ( and bid up ) his stock portfolio , he’s now suggesting that the unborn should be allowed to do so.
I say we should go ahead and pass legislation to let the unborn fully participate in financial markets , ASAP , in the hope that it shuts this man up , once and for all.
My Eldest Daughter’s Treasury Direct account was set up (by me) to automatically roll over her purchase of 5-year CMTs. All she has to do is pass it on, and Farmer’s claim will be falsified.
Assuming, of course, that no one ever needs to access the principal (see that “excessively volatile” comment that elides a lot of risk, not to mention rules that have artificially inflated the Equity Premium over time.)
What ever you call ‘Atlas Shrugged’, it is not short-form anything.