Goldman Critics vs. Little Goldmans

by Chidem Kurdas

Goldman Sachs has become exhibit number one in attacks on Wall Street and capitalist greed. Last week’s announcement that the bank had strong third-quarter earnings and is on track to pay big bonuses added to the media feeding frenzy.

Let’s look at the logic – to the extent there is logic – in the mass fury.  The assault on Goldman contains at least three, related but distinct, complaints.

• The bank’s profits are not just obscene but the result of reckless bets. “Goldman is back to business as usual: making money by high-risk gambling,” writes Frank Rich in the NYT, to pick one out of a herd of writers sounding the same theme.

Boudreaux Wins!

by Mario Rizzo

Some very good news. Don Boudreaux, Professor of Economics at George Mason University and former president of the Foundation for Economic Education, has been awarded the Thomas Szasz Award for Contributions to Civil Liberties. Although Don is an economist, his commitment to liberty is broad-based. He understands that freedom is important in all areas of human society and life.

For a more complete announcement of the award see the FEE blog,  Anything Peaceful.

Congratulations to Don!

Against Magical Thinking

by Roger Koppl

The term “magical thinking” has different meanings, most of them involving something like extrasensory perception or the efficacy of spells.  Here I define it as an argument, one of whose steps requires something impossible.  (Larry White helped me with this definition, but gets no blame for it or anything I say here.)  It is not magic thinking if your argument has an unexplained piece.  Darwin knew didn’t have anything like Mendelevian genetics as a mechanism.  That was a hole in his theory, eventually filled by others.  No magic there.  Magical thinking exists when one fills the gap with something that is logically or physically impossible.

If you can show I have engaged in magical thinking, you have overturned my argument.  

Elinor Ostrom and the Relevance of Economics

by Mario Rizzo  

The work of Elinor Ostrom, the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize in economics, is not very well-known among economists. In fact, I would venture the guess than most economists had not heard of her before the prize was announced yesterday morning.  

Two reasons for this are that her degree is in political science and she has written for publications outside of the mainstream economics journals. Additionally, her work, by and large, lacks the high degree of mathematical formalism now so characteristic of economics.  

Yet the Nobel Prize Committee has done a great service to economics and the greater social-scientific community.

Mises Was A Scientist

by Roger Koppl

Over at Division of Labor, Noel Campbell picks a fight with Austrian fans of Mises.  “I always conceived of Mises’ efforts as attempting to build a logically correct and (therefore) irrefutable description of human behavior. As such, I always viewed Human Action as a work of philosophy, not science.”   Noel hints that he doesn’t want to be answered with a lot of philosophy of science.  I might whine about how unfair it is to contrast Mises’ “philosophy” with “science” and then expect a response that doesn’t get into the philosophy of science.  But Noel seems to be a nice guy with a sincere question, so I’ll take a stab at it anyway.

The Political Element In Empirical Data?

by Mario Rizzo  

In a recent article in the Financial Times Joseph Stiglitz argues for a more comprehensive measure of social well-being than Gross Domestic Product (GDP).  

As all principles of economics students know, GDP leaves out many interesting things. When I was a student the prime example was: When a man marries his paid housekeeper GDP falls. I am not sure how to adjust this if the housekeeper is also a man and they move to a state with gay marriage. Humor aside, you get the point. GDP misses stuff.  

Nevertheless, Stiglitz has bigger fish to fry. This is just a sample:  

“What we measure affects what we do. If we have the wrong metrics, we will strive for the wrong things. In the quest to increase GDP, we may end up with a society in which most citizens have become worse off. We care, moreover, not just for how well off we are today but how well off we will be in the future. If we are borrowing unsustainably from this future, we should want to know.” 

Did I get all the “we’s”?

“Causes of the Crisis Blog”

by Sandy Ikeda

Following up on its recent issue on the financial crisis, Critical Review has started a blog with contributors to that issue doing the posting.  So far they have “disputed the theory that bankers’ bonuses, irrational exuberance, or capitalism caused the crisis. And four posts have debated the role of economic theory in failing to understand the crisis.”

Contributors listed under the fold.

Thomas Friedman Is Wrong

by Roger Koppl

Thomas Friedman defends “one-party autocracy” as represented by China. Presumably, his defense is a sardonic. He is trying to smack down the Republican Party in the US for “standing, arms folded and saying ‘no.’” Sardonic tone notwithstanding, he says something revealing. “It is not an accident that China is committed to overtaking us in electric cars, solar power, energy efficiency, batteries, nuclear power and wind power. China’s leaders understand that in a world of exploding populations and rising emerging-market middle classes, demand for clean power and energy efficiency is going to soar. Beijing wants to make sure that it owns that industry and is ordering the policies to do that, including boosting gasoline prices, from the top down.”

Auction Markets and Optimally Sticky Prices

by Joseph T. Salerno

Keynesian macroeconomists, old and new, have long criticized their classical and contemporary opponents for ignoring reality and treating the market economy as a giant auction in which prices are “perfectly flexible,” responding instantly to changes in supply and demand.  This charge is wrong on two counts.  First, all markets for outputs and inputs function precisely like auctions; and, second, auctions are not characterized by perfectly flexible prices but by an optimal degree of stickiness in prices that is determined by the market itself.

In this post I will deal with second point, because it has been generally neglected in responding to the Keynesians.  To illustrate this point I will use the example of a one day on-site auction of 49 unsold condominiums at a 73-unit complex that recently took place in Auburn, Alabama and which I also happened to attend.

Neither Charity Nor Truth, Part 3: The Attack on Classical Liberalism

by Mario Rizzo  

In this final installment of my analysis of the papal encyclical letter Caritas in Veritate I turn my attention to Benedict XVI’s positive ideas on globalization.  (I put the encyclical section numbers in parentheses.)  

Do not expect clear-cut statements or precise recommendations for policy. Do not even expect consistency. (There are actually some good parts as in Sections 57 and 58.)  

The encyclical bears the mark of a committee’s work, presumably approved by the pope. There are individual sections that stress different, and contrary, attitudes so it is difficult to come away with a clear picture. Anyone looking for real guidance will have to seek it elsewhere.  

Nevertheless, a certain grand vision is revealed about society. The pope seems to be an enemy of the idea of beneficial spontaneous ordering forces.