The field was rigid and closed until Mark Thoma’s Economist’s View opened the debate to all comers
Noah Smith’s The End of Econ Blogging’s Golden Age, Bloomberg Opinion. December 17, 2019.
“If someone asked you to name the greatest economics blogger of all time, you might name Paul Krugman, or my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Tyler Cowen. But there’s a third name that deserves to be on that short list: Mark Thoma, an economics professor at the University of Oregon. On Friday, Thoma announced a well-deserved retirement. But the changes his blog made in the economics profession will endure.
Thoma’s blog, Economist’s View, began in 2005.”
The rest of the article can be found on the link provided above. As I was told, Angry Bear Blog linked to Economist’s View in the beginning.
Mark announced his retirement Friday, December 13, 2019. Best of luck going forward Mark.
“Angry Bear Blog linked to Economist’s View in the beginning. Angry Bear Blog linked to Economist’s View in the beginning.”
Recall that 2005 was when George W. Bush started to push his Social Security deform ideas. As one of the original Angrybears, I recall writing a lot of blog posts that criticized Bush’s spin on this issue and we started noticed some very excellent arguments for Social Security coming from this newcomer Mark Thoma. So of course we highlighted his excellent contributions to this important issue.
PGL:
Thank you for commenting. I did not arrive here until this decade and only because Bruce started to correct my perception on Social Security at Economist’s View. I had been writing about Diamond and Orszag ‘s version at the time. Things changed after listening to Bruce and then Coberly.
You added a lot of perspective which I do not have. I am glad you are here.
I posted there warning about debt expansion. Nobody listened.
pgl is right that AB was an early outlet for those of us, some coming out of Econospeak and before that Maxspeak, standing up for Social Security against a bipartisan push to reduce it.
I completely agree on the importance of Mark Thoma. He has cut back on his blogging, and I fear he may do so more. In any case, his historical importance is unquestionable.
Barkley:
It is a pleasure having you here along with PGL, Peter, and Tom. Both Dan and I hope to keep AB going and providing fresh points of view economics and otherwise. Mark leaves a gap which may never be filled in the same manner as what he did. Dan and I will have to talk a bit to see if we can find a way to duplicate it in a similar manner as what Mark did at Economists View.