by Sandwichman Zero-Sum Foolery 4 of 4: Wage Prisoner’s Dilemma Soon after the wages-fund doctrine fell out of favor with economists, it was immediately attributed to trade unionists under the label of the “fixed work-fund fallacy” and then the “Theory of the lump of labour.” In denunciations of the lump-of-labor fallacy, it has become fashionable […]
I’m getting really good at recognizing instantly the latest vapid or ridiculous soundbite that Clinton has settled on and will be repeating again and again. So I detected her latest one the moment she introduced it at last Thursday’s debate: It’s easy to diagnose the problem. You’ve got to be able to solve the problem. […]
by Sandwichman Foolery 1: Games Theory Gamesmanship Foolery 2: Doomsday Climate Machine Zero-Sum Foolery 3 of 4: Forecast Factory Long before the issue of anthropogenic climate change arrived on the doomsday agenda, Lewis F. Richardson anticipated climate modeling with his failed attempt to forecast weather numerically. His calculations predicted surface pressures 150 times higher than observed: […]
by Lynn Paramour (via Alternet) Is the 1% Really the Problem? “We are the 99 percent” is a great slogan, but is it distracting our attention from a sinister reality? There’s strong evidence that it’s not the 1 percent you should worry about—it’s the 0.1 percent. That decimal point makes a big difference. … The 99 […]
I recently asked if increased government debt causes increased welfare if the growth rate of the economy is greater than the safe rate of interest, even if the growth rate is lower than the risky rate of return on capital. With much help from a comment by Nick Rowe, I present an example in which […]
[Paul Krugman] has a negative view of Bernie Sanders “Why I Haven’t Felt the Bern “ which links to his column on insulting Dixie. The post is brief and a bit odd — Krugman criticizes Sanders for: “… the casual adoption, with no visible effort to check the premises, of a story line that sounds good. It’s all […]
by Peter Dorman (originally from Econospeak) Good Jobs for Non-College Grads It’s good to see that Katherine Newman has spoken up for really investing in kids who aren’t going on to college, which will always be a substantial chunk of them, no matter what. If there’s any sort of social contract worth defending, it has to […]
Still looking for a case in which I disagree with Paul Krugman, I jump in the deep end and discuss his thoughts on international trade in “The Return of Elasticity Pessimism (Wonkish)”. That is “the belief that trade flows barely respond to price signals, and hence that devaluations don’t help alleviate imbalances.” It is amazing […]
I have long been embarrassed by the fact that I almost always agree with Paul Krugman — I fear that I am not an independent thinker. I eagerly look for chances to disagree and see two promising possibilities at his blog. He has a negative view of Bernie Sanders “Why I Haven’t Felt the Bern […]
As for Clinton herself, her bandwagon-jumping nature is a big reason why so many people dislike her. But in this instance there was the additional element of dishonesty: she knew that Sanders rather than the editorial board members had it right about what Dodd-Frank provides. She had said so publicly, recently, in a statement in […]