Is it time to put Keynesianism out of it's misery yet?

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thrustbucket

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Time to Topple Keynesian Economics

It's too long to paste in it's entirety here, so I recommend you read the link.

When we look at profligate governments, those in debt and getting deeper into debt, like those responsible for governing the UK, the USA, Greece, Portugal, Spain, France, Ireland and others; there are presumably professional economists in the background. Over the past ten to twenty years of government overspending, some senior public servants, trained in the rigorous discipline of economics, must surely have been giving consistent and fearless advice that it would all end in tears. Or have they?

Take the massive government spending employed by most countries to combat the global financial crisis (GFC). There was no evident sign that senior public sector economists were urging some modicum of restraint. The reverse appeared to be the case. Ken Henry was certainly not urging restraint. We need a stimulus package and we need it now, summed up his position. The US Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, was an enthusiastic advocate of stimulus spending and apparently remains wedded to still more, if his comments at the G20 meeting in Toronto in June are any guide.

Wherever we look, the economics profession in government service appears to have been hijacked by interventionist Keynesian economists. Politics is part of this but it is by no means the whole. Some so-called economists are left-wing ideologues. Most, however, are simply victims of someone described colourfully by Thomas Woods in Meltdown as “one of the twentieth century’s crackpots”: John Maynard Keynes.

Crackpot or not, Keynes has spawned generations of economists and politicians who think that spending money is the same thing as making money. You might recall Michael Douglas’s character in War of the Roses saying to his wife (played by Kathleen Turner): “It’s a lot easier to spend it than it is to make it, honeybun!” Well, not according Keynesian economists, it isn’t.

Keynesian economists believe in the spurious and curious notion that economies are driven by spending rather than by making. To them spending is an economy’s driving force. There are three mutually reinforcing factors at work that promote and sustain this belief. One is the way economics is taught; a second is the formation of a “conventional wisdom” around Keynesian economics; the third is the way the national accounts and macroeconomic modelling “bulletproof” this conventional wisdom against any and every experience. I will go through these factors in turn before attempting to assess whether the times make Keynesian economics ripe for toppling.
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It then goes on to make it's case against those three things. Read the article for that.

It concludes:
Keynesians believe that economies are driven by demand. If private sector demand is insufficient they believe that it must be supplemented by government demand to ensure full employment. The key to undoing Keynesianism—if it is to be undone—is to hold it to account.

When resources are unemployed, Keynesians believe that government spending will always have net beneficial economic consequences. Government spending will result directly or indirectly in sufficient real economic gain to more than offset any attendant real economic costs. There may be costs. Keynes himself raised the possibility of government spending and borrowing crowding out some private sector demand. Nevertheless, any such costs are assumed to be less than the gain.

If Keynesians do not believe this; then I don’t know what they believe. I get a good sense that Paul Krugman believes it and perhaps Geithner. But what about all those governments and their economic advisers who are now preaching spending restraint when their economies are recessed; with plenty of unemployed resources ready to be put to work? Are they all Keynesians still? What do they believe now?

If Keynesianism works it works. Keynesians should explain with conviction, despite massive government debt, that it would be beneficial for European economies to stimulate more. They should explain that this would produce net economic gain and a better ability to service debt. If they were convincing enough, perhaps capital markets would be supportive. None of that will happen, of course, because most of them have lost their Keynesian faith; though they probably still cling to its trappings.

The time is right to lose the trappings too. That requires something to be put in its place. That something is an appreciation that the economy has to be seen as economists before Keynes saw it; as a whole and complex collection of many interrelated parts, not as a limited set of amorphous aggregates.

The European and United States debt crisis is a march of events to which Keynesianism has no answer. It is palpably failing and should be discarded. The times are demonstrating its poverty. It was always poverty-stricken and enervating but its deleterious impact was hidden by economists wielding meaningless and deceptive proofs of its success; by the resilience of market economies in the face of government economic mismanagement; and by the fact that even profligate governments take time to run down rich estates.

There is recognition within economics that governments provide enormous and essential assistance to economic progress by enshrining property rights within the law. Government is seen as providing a legal umbrella within which markets play out. Government economic policy should be similarly nuanced. The guiding principle should be to provide a stable, supportive and flexible environment within which market economies, and their constituent households, workers and firms, can prosper in normal times and, importantly, adjust in distressed times.

Politics and economics appear to go hand in hand these days. Economics should be objective. Economics is subjective in the hands of the Left who particularly favour the interventionist character of Keynesianism. It is then not a question of whether it is right but whether it satisfies a worldview that capitalism needed saving from itself by big government. The debt crises in Europe and in the United States make it evident that big government is the problem and that Keynesianism is part of that problem.

Economists, particular those in government service, should consign their existing macroeconomics to the dustbin and, perhaps, start reading some older texts. They certainly need to build their macroeconomics around microeconomic foundations, not as a disembodied artefact. As hard as that all is, unless it is done, toppling Keynesianism might be like toppling socialism. It will keep popping back up.
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To me, I think Keynesian thought has lead to stuff like this recent funism:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5Ul9fPLzz0
 
"Some so-called economists are left-wing ideologues."
I suppose there are no RIGHT-WING ideologues in economics?

Extreme laissez-faire economics is simply a THEORY. Just like communism, there has never been a pure form of this ideological perspective in the real world. That being said we must look at the economy here and now. That is called pragmatism. There are A LOT of things wrong with our economy.

A major problem which the able excerrpt alludes to is the concept of "making money." The introduction and ubiquity of credit is a great example of this. Interest and credit create money out of thin air. The Federal Reserve (which is run by the banks) also facilitates this with fractional reserve banking.

With that being said, our economy is so proped up by money that created out of thin air. With the economic crisis at the tail end of Bush's presidency, they had two options. 1. Let the chips fall where they may or 2. Gov't intervention (Keynesian econ)

If they followed #1, then their would be economic collapse and then social collapse. Would you want this? Possible anarchy?

#2 is good if you want to stave off that. There is no way you can keep the economy running without stimulus spending. If that was the route, Obama needed to spend maybe double and actually create jobs which then would create real revenue. And funnelling it to banks who should have crashed. But, if the big, bloated, monopolistic banks crashed then our economy would go kaput. They should have been taken over and broken up.

I think right now is not the time to fantasize about free-market extremism theories. It should have been done before, like during say Reagan who contrary to the mythology was a protectionist. You know, that distinction between rhetoric and reality. The idea of letting the econ and society has some appeal to see where that would go but in the end people don't want that. And Americans do not want to reduce their standard of living. We would never be the powerhouse we were if that were allowed to happen.

"Politics is the shadow cast on society by big business... the attenuation of the shadow will not change the substance." - John Dewey
 
The spending is great, but no amount of spending by itself is enough. To say that Keynesians believe that government spending will always have net positive consequences is incorrect. You have to have the right policies in place in other areas or you're just throwing it out the window. The stimulus has done a fair job, but only 1/3 of the $787 billion was actually for job creation - to fill a $2 trillion hole. With our trade policies, it has stimulated foreign economies more than it should. 1/3 of the stimulus was tax cuts, which are useless. The last 1/3 was cash for state deficits, which saved a lot of jobs but didn't do much to net more.

The debt isnt particularly great, but its not terrible. Progressives would have things actually paid for, but there is not the will to raise taxes back to pre-Reagan levels. Whenever you borrow money, as long as your investment of that money returns more than the interest rate, then the loan was a good idea.

Blumenthal hit it 12 seconds in. Jobs are created for one, and only one reason ever - to meet a demand. Any other reason, like taxes, if fiction of the highest order.

A real collapse might have been good, in that a bigger crisis would allow for more substantial action. You'd get to see what REAL liberal policies are like. We've largely left everything the same, so maybe we'll get another shot sooner rather than later. We put a small bandage on a huge free-trade, deregulated wound, and it wont hold for long.
 
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[quote name='Dr Mario Kart']You'd get to see what REAL liberal policies are like.[/QUOTE]

ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner.

you're a conclusion in search of justification, thrustbucket. i've said that about you for as long as I can recall, and it's just as true today.

you live in denial of the disastrous economic impact of thirty years of trickle-down economic policies - on earnings, on the power of workers, on inflation, and on the exponential growth in the gap between income quintiles, which translates into not just differences in income, but in wealth as well. it's three decades of preposterous ideas, and those same ideas are what's drawing people to the polls - they're also what you will vote for, with a noble intent in your heart, on election day.

thirty years of failed economics that got us to where we were are today, and you're ready to blame the attempt to stave off economic collapse?

what do we need to get the economy back on track? more tax cuts for big businesses? extend the Bush tax cuts for everyone, but especially those who earn $250K or more per year? If Keynesian solutions are not ideal, what do you recommend? Trickle-down policies are embarrassingly more inept (and long since disproven, if the right were into empiricism more than dogma we'd see that) than what we've got under Obama.

By the way, TARP will turn a profit for the government. How about them apples?
 
Conclusion looking for justification? I'm pretty sure I have had views changed by evidence several times over compared to you, myke.

What I really love is this notion that if liberal polices were all in place like liberal polices were MEANT to be, we'd live in some kind of goddamn paradise of equality and prosperity. Then it's followed up with excuses for things being the way they are because only SOME liberal polices have been put into place without OTHER liberal policies to make them really work.

Of course, that logic never applies to conservative policies. That's because every single conservative policy is outright fascism that only caters to the greedy or established rich, right?:roll:

Nope.

The truth is we have NOT had economic policies that provided true trickle-down economics in the last 30 years (except maybe briefly in the Reagan era, which went very well). That's my point. The economic recovery in the 20's - the raging booming, roaring, everyone-gets-electricity-and-indoor refrigeration 20's. The everyone buys a car WITH CASH, 20's. came SPECIFICALLY because the wealthiest people and the biggest businesses were provided with tax cuts.

Nobody else was really paying taxes before that anyway, just the rich, aAnd nobody but the rich are paying taxes today (nor in the last 30 years).

Don't claim the status quo is an attempt at trickle-down. That has not happened on a large-enough scale since the 1920's.

And why the hell should we want TARP to be turning a profit for the government? If they turn a profit, can we tax them at 50%? Isn't that anti-ethical to both our positions?
 
where to even *start* with you? what you argue is so off the wall that calling it ludicrous would be giving it more credit than it deserves.

so i'll let someone else take care of that for me. i have things to do today - certainly more important things than someone who doesn't think that we had trickle-down policies over the past thirty years. what would you dare call the bush tax cuts (both of them), corn subsidies, tax subsidies for businesses, etc.?

you shouldn't be allowed to have an opinion, quite frankly, because your understanding of the world is so far off base.
 
This made me literally laugh out loud when I read it earlier.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101006/ap_on_el_ge/us_ap_poll_working_class_whites

"Democrats are more apt to mess with the middle class and take our money," said Lawrence Ramsey, 56, a warehouse manager in Winston-Salem, N.C.
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Now unless he's an extremely well paid warehouse manager, nobody is trying to mess with his income. Also, the bit about Obama not being centrist I agree with, excpet I see him as too far right while I'd bet my life they meant too far left. Apparently being a centrist means caving (even more) to conservative demands.
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']And nobody but the rich are paying taxes today (nor in the last 30 years).[/QUOTE]

I'm certainly paying taxes and there's no way in hell that I'm rich.

I don't understand why you two have to sit and point fingers and call names. It's like a microcosm of the futility of national politics as they currently stand.

Why must everything be so black and white? Trickle Down economics can work to a certain degree, and so can Trickle Up. Finding the balance AND THEN NOT fuckING WITH IT would probably fix at least 1/3rd of the problem. But I suppose if there's balance then no one can swoop in and take credit and that's just not any fun is it?
 
Corn fucking subsidies?!?!?! Seriously?

Corn subsidies are a government handout. Here's why: you are a corn farmer. you believe in the free market. you manage your farm well, sell corn at great prices, conserve your resources, maintain your own equipment, and do everything in your power to be competitive with other corn farmers in america. and you are "winning out" over the competition because you work hard. then uncle sam steps in and offers your competitors who DIDN'T conserve like you, sold less corn because they were charging too much, and etc., a bundle of cash to grow corn again next year, putting you at a disadvantage in the market. What is the point of trying to sell at a low price, while still covering your costs and bringing in a little profit, if you can't compete with your neighbor who can sell his corn for almost nothing because the government already coverd his costs and bailed him out?

This is exactly the position of Ford right now. They played by the rules, managed well, didn't go bankrupt, and outperformeed GM. But then the Federal Gvt gives GM a whopping free ticket? You want to argue that's good? You want to say it needs to happen MORE?

The same is true of housing. If the government subsidizes housing, and I am a good citizen who has been saving for a home, the subsidy floods the market with buyers and drives the house prices up, which punish people who play by the real rules of business and economics.

Shit. It's like arguing that sucking cock encourages morality.

Efforts at true trickle-down in the past 30 years can be equated to driving a race car with 2 blown cylinders and the handbrake on. Both parties to blame.

Subsidy and business? Honestly? Those two words don't even belong in the same sentence. Any and all subsidies are anti-business and free-market. Subsidies and bailouts don't stimulate economic growth, they slap it in the balls (see Ford).

Honestly, myke, whenever you finally get bored of condescension, I'm convinced now more than ever that you are determined to be wearing your semen stained "TARP Rulez!" t-shirt stand and voraciously cheer for Paul Krugman as he maniacally humps the captain of the titanic.
 
I don't think GM was given money to save the company, but rather to save the associated jobs. I don't think anyone in the government gave a damn about GM the company. Most of those liberal commies probably own foreign cars anyway.
 
Saying the Keynesian response has failed is like saying modern medicine has failed because a doctor under prescribed a drug and therefore we should go back bloodletting and prayer.
 
She gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the private sector. He gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the public sector.

Blumenthal should stick with what he's good at and she should too.

[quote name='thrustbucket']The truth is we have NOT had economic policies that provided true trickle-down economics in the last 30 years (except maybe briefly in the Reagan era, which went very well). That's my point.[/QUOTE]

[quote name='pullcontainer']
What I really love is this notion that if trickle-down polices were all in place like trickle-down polices were MEANT to be, we'd live in some kind of goddamn paradise of equality and prosperity. Then it's followed up with excuses for things being the way they are because only SOME trickle-down polices have been put into place without OTHER trickle-down policies to make them really work.[/QUOTE]
 
[quote name='IRHari']She gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the private sector. He gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the public sector.
Blumenthal should stick with what he's good at and she should too.
[/QUOTE]

...

Is it just me or does IRHari believe that an elected official shouldn't have to give a crap or know anything about the private sector?
 
[quote name='Msut77']Saying the Keynesian response has failed is like saying modern medicine has failed because a doctor under prescribed a drug and therefore we should go back bloodletting and prayer.[/QUOTE]

Oh I don't know. The arts of Conjuring (which is exactly what creating money out of nothing and spending it is) might fit better with bloodletting and prayer than simply only spending what ya got.

Radical idea though, I know.
 
[quote name='Msut77']Saying the Keynesian response has failed is like saying modern medicine has failed because a doctor under prescribed a drug and therefore we should go back bloodletting and prayer.[/QUOTE]

Oh I don't know. The practice of Conjuring (creating something out of nothing and spending it) might better be classified alongside bloodletting and prayer than simply only spending what ya got.

Radical idea though, so who knows.

[quote name='IRHari']She gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the private sector. He gave an excellent answer for someone who is in the public sector.

Blumenthal should stick with what he's good at and she should too.[/QUOTE]

Except that you can probably count on one hand how many actually think, in this unemployment crisis, that the suggestion of "creating jobs" would at all imply new government jobs.
That would be trying to fix one of our top two problems by making one worse.

Maybe that just speaks for the type of people we certainly do not want to be voting for, if what you say is true.
 
Quick question, was the act of the federal government assuming the debt of the states after the revolution an act of big government bailing out the states? Shouldn't the states have paid their own debts?
 
It is certainly the case that we havent tried a pure ____. Because democracies don't employ pure ideologies. Partially because compromises have to be made, partially because they are fictional. It is also the case that subsidies are a function of government. However, to the extent that there is any government at all, any business that is able to bend government policy to its benefit is going to have an advantage over its competition. In the event that the government is so small as to not have the power to levy such policies, then the corporations can take anti-competitive, monopoly control themselves without the middle man.

I dont know how you can say that what we did during Reagan was only a short lived thing that hasnt been in constant use since.

Por ejemplo: google any graph of productivity (supply) vs wages (demand). You get something like this

productivitywagesgraph.gif


Something very curious happened after 1980 and has been happening since. This is supply side economics in action, to the extent to which we have employed it.
 
bit of a misnomer there as PC's made a HUGE boost in productivity in the early 80's as they became more affordable and practical for your average worker to use. Wages didn't increase concurrently mainly do to the infrastructure investment in technology.
Now that technology is dirt cheap, wages have been increasing for the same job rather substantially over the last 5 years. If you graduate with an accounting degree now, you're basically going to get paid more than the same graduate 5 years ago. If you can find a job at least.
We've also had what, 4 minimum wage increases since then? If that's the case, shouldn't there be a bump to correspond with each wage increase? Oh yeah, they don't work...
 
Thrust, could you explain how Keynesian theory has destroyed Ireland? Please include their tax rate changes and austerity measures in your explanation.

thx.
 
[quote name='Knoell']Is it just me or does IRHari believe that an elected official shouldn't have to give a crap or know anything about the private sector?[/QUOTE]

It's just you. You don't know what I believe. You don't know me brutha.
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']Oh I don't know. The practice of Conjuring (creating something out of nothing and spending it) might better be classified alongside bloodletting and prayer[/quote]

If conjuring actually worked as advertised, i.e. something actually appeared it wouldn't be a joke.

speed:

Thrust, could you explain how Keynesian theory has destroyed Ireland? Please include their tax rate changes and austerity measures in your explanation.
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Being a fundamentalist of what amounts to as much a cult as political movement is probably too much fun to let facts get in the way.
 
If I was in charge of directing economic policy, I'd kill people (selected at random by lottery) and make them into quality furniture. Thus as a society we'd have a reduced need for Ikea and Walmart's shoddy import furniture, and since we'd have longer lasting furniture made from human remains, as a whole society could direct its efforts into other areas which need improving.

Less population due to genocide = a decrease in competition in the workforce. Wages will have to go up because of the simple fact that there would be less people available (and skilled enough) to maintain the infrastructure of the American civilization. You'd have some decrease in demand for products, but at the same time the availability of natural resources should increase, so while a business might be selling less it would cost them much less to acquire materials for manufacturing. Look at the Mediterranean after the Roman Empire fell. They didn't even have to quarry marble anymore, they could just pull it down from existing buildings and recycle it...

Our current economic system is insane; it accelerates competition and resource consumption until there's no other option but to go to war somewhere else on the planet; so instead of getting our own habits under control we loot and pillage other countries as a safety valve. For us it's always easier to deprive and kill the children of another nation rather than our own--now if this sounds crazy to you, then just ask yourself; why can't the U.S. get out of the Middle East, why do we need a presence in nearly every country on the planet? Why must our economics always be based on the ethics of a conqueror?
 
[quote name='nasum']
We've also had what, 4 minimum wage increases since then? If that's the case, shouldn't there be a bump to correspond with each wage increase? Oh yeah, they don't work...[/QUOTE]

not going up fast enough:

image1n.gif


While there are differing metrics that the people that make those charts use (some use only workers that MAKE things, for instance, it is generally wages adjusted for inflation, or real wages.

Secondarily, our trade/tax policies inexplicably allow and incentivize hiring outside the country instead.

I havent been able to find a chart for it, but my understanding is that there was also a temporary divergence during the industrial revolution, since the individual worker suddenly became much more productive than they were able to before. However, those lines eventually got back into going up together, as it SHOULD.
 
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[quote name='speedracer']Thrust, could you explain how Keynesian theory has destroyed Ireland? Please include their tax rate changes and austerity measures in your explanation.

thx.[/QUOTE]
Thrust, could you explain how Keynesian theory has destroyed Greece? Please include their tax rate changes and austerity measures in your explanation.

thx.
 
Did you want to discuss the myriad of differences between the US and those countries now or later (per capita gdp, global influence, population etc)? Or would that ruin the macro/micro comparison your drum roll was leading up to?

If everything is apples and apples, maybe you would like me to explain keynesianism on the mon next?
 
The first line of your quoted article:
When we look at profligate governments, those in debt and getting deeper into debt, like those responsible for governing the UK, the USA, Greece, Portugal, Spain, France, Ireland and others
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The thesis is ostensibly that Keynesian economic policy is running rampant and damaging economies. I thought we'd look close at the two countries most in trouble: Greece and Ireland. Did Keynesian policy get them where they are today? I think the rational place to start is what policies (if any) did either country have that could be directly tied to Keynesian thought. So what policies did they enact that support your thesis?

That's my question to you.
 
[quote name='Knoell']"I have never been to this wetland, I don't know anyone affected by it, but I will be damned if I let someone develop there!"

"People who protest are ALWAYS involved directly with what they are protesting, or else they shouldn't care"

I will keep that in mind next time some jackass prevents development of land because it will hurt the local algae population. "Well it doesn't really affect you beyond your direct scope."[/QUOTE]

LOL - as if enviornmentalists have any power in this country.

Not to worry - American corporations are not going to stop until they destroy every mountaintop, beach, and freshwater lake in their voracious search for resources.
 
Thats where that post went, I meant it for the other thread, but then I couldn't find it. My bad. I will delete it.

Edit: Ok I can't delete posts, so I probably should have just edited the one I wanted to delete instead of posting another one.
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']Did you want to discuss the myriad of differences between the US and those countries now or later (per capita gdp, global influence, population etc)? Or would that ruin the macro/micro comparison your drum roll was leading up to?[/QUOTE]

I think it would just be faster for you to admit you don't know anything about anything thrust.
 
if govt intervention in the economy (the bold print of Keyesian theory if you want the soundbyte version) has apparently "screwed" the countries listed in the thrustbucket request, how come dirty socialist Canada isn't in ruins?
Precisely why thrust mentioned. Population, natural resources, export potential, etc...

In a limited scale the theory is sound, it's just that 380 million people (or whatever the US is at now) isn't really a limited scale anymore.

Oh yeah, China. How does that work?
 
[quote name='nasum']if govt intervention in the economy (the bold print of Keyesian theory if you want the soundbyte version) has apparently "screwed" the countries listed in the thrustbucket request, how come dirty socialist Canada isn't in ruins?
Precisely why thrust mentioned. Population, natural resources, export potential, etc...

In a limited scale the theory is sound, it's just that 380 million people (or whatever the US is at now) isn't really a limited scale anymore.

Oh yeah, China. How does that work?[/QUOTE]
Damn it. You give away my long position punch line and Msut states outright my short position punch line about an adherent to an article that cites Ireland and Greece as counter Keynesian examples.

Oh well. It's not like he'd get it anyhow.

I spent a decent part of my weekend laughing and feeling a sense of utter doom over this thread. Not only did someone write that piece of shit article, but others are linking it. The linkers are exactly the type to talk about the ignorance of Americans and trash like that.
[quote name='Msut77']I think it would just be faster for you to admit you don't know anything about anything thrust.[/QUOTE]
The boat. She is missed. Que bob coming in to talk about the decorum and this thread is fin.
 
Didn't Bush tell us to spend to get over 9/11?

It's OK now. Go spend those dollars. And now it's a vast left wing conspiracy to get us into even more debt?
 
[quote name='Msut77']I think it would just be faster for you to admit you don't know anything about anything thrust.[/QUOTE]
You've spent far longer in these forums demonstrating how little you know about pretty much everything, so you first?
But if you at least made a good point for every three personal attacks you made, you might be on less people's ignore list.

[quote name='speedracer']Damn it. You give away my long position punch line and Msut states outright my short position punch line about an adherent to an article that cites Ireland and Greece as counter Keynesian examples.

Oh well. It's not like he'd get it anyhow.

I spent a decent part of my weekend laughing and feeling a sense of utter doom over this thread. Not only did someone write that piece of shit article, but others are linking it. The linkers are exactly the type to talk about the ignorance of Americans and trash like that.

The boat. She is missed. Que bob coming in to talk about the decorum and this thread is fin.[/QUOTE]

Yep. You gots me.
Man, you women are incredulous. I posted the link to spark some conversation about economic policies and whether they work. I have no stance on this stuff, I am no economist beyond knowing that spending money I don't have is usually bad. I just like to spark discussion - since most of you have your heads up the same political ass - it's an attempt at getting some fires kindled in the VS FORUM.

But no.

Speedracer: "You have presented your case, sir. Now it is up to me to take on the intellectual mantle, rally my beloved followers - and dismantle your ridiculous post in my most Rachel Maddow inspired condescending beratement to impress even my dad!!! Muahahah!"

Me: "Um, ok... you go girl! Tear it apart!"

You kids are as boring - and as predictable as schoolyard children writing a pamphlet on the color blue these days...time to get some fresh blood. At least myke would have written something interesting on why he believes printing funny money for eternity to pump into every social program makes sense.

Serious blue balls....
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']You've spent far longer in these forums demonstrating how little you know about pretty much everything, so you first?[/quote]

Oh yeah thrust, I remember all the incredibly insightful comments you made in the various healthcare threads.

No sorry, that isn't true because you made no worthwhile posts in a year long thread.

But if you at least made a good point for every three personal attacks you made, you might be on less people's ignore list.
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People say I am a wee bit hard on idiots but no one can say with a straight face that I don't know my shit.

I cannot even remember the last time you even discussed an econometric for example.

You are avoiding substance by pulling the butthurt card, spare me.
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']Yep. You gots me.
Man, you women are incredulous. I posted the link to spark some conversation about economic policies and whether they work. I have no stance on this stuff, I am no economist beyond knowing that spending money I don't have is usually bad. I just like to spark discussion - since most of you have your heads up the same political ass - it's an attempt at getting some fires kindled in the VS FORUM.

But no.

Speedracer: "You have presented your case, sir. Now it is up to me to take on the intellectual mantle, rally my beloved followers - and dismantle your ridiculous post in my most Rachel Maddow inspired condescending beratement to impress even my dad!!! Muahahah!"

Me: "Um, ok... you go girl! Tear it apart!"

You kids are as boring - and as predictable as schoolyard children writing a pamphlet on the color blue these days...time to get some fresh blood. At least myke would have written something interesting on why he believes printing funny money for eternity to pump into every social program makes sense.

Serious blue balls....[/QUOTE]

You throw the golden apple on the table and then get mad when everyone points out that it's really just a polished turd?

You sound like a second-rate troll here
 
Not an insult, just some gratuitous sexism here and there.

Although maybe everyone here IS female and I'm the only male. I don't know.
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']I have no stance on this stuff, I am no economist beyond knowing that spending money I don't have is usually bad. [/QUOTE]

That's way too simple ;) ... we have to start throwing out various vague economic references to show that printing money out of thin air and spending it ad libitum is a good thing.

As much as people don't like to hear this, the basic laws of science and mathematics still apply to this situation. For example.

* conservation of mass/energy = printing more money that is not backed by a commodity devalues the currency.

* For positive numbers a and b, if a > b, then b - a = c, where c is a negative number = if you spend more than you earn, you will have a deficit.

* compound interest follows an exponential function; as the abscissa (e.g., time) increases, the ordinate reaches a point at which it becomes very large very fast = if you have a large debt that you are not paying down, eventually your debt will be so large as to make it impossible to pay off.

The simple things...
 
[quote name='BigT']That's way too simple ;) ... we have to start throwing out various vague economic references to show that printing money out of thin air and spending it ad libitum is a good thing.[/quote]

Because going into debt is never a good idea.

Just like how we never should have fought WWII too expensive right?

Or your supposed med school debt, that shit will never pay off right?

As much as people don't like to hear this, the basic laws of science and mathematics still apply to this situation.
Click to expand...

Which is funny because the people pushing your kool aid tend to come from the "math is hard" school of economics.

The simple things...
Click to expand...

More like simple minded.
 
[quote name='Msut77']Because going into debt is never a good idea.

Just like how we never should have fought WWII too expensive right?

Or your supposed med school debt, that shit will never pay off right?



Which is funny because the people pushing your kool aid tend to come from the "math is hard" school of economics.



More like simple minded.[/QUOTE]

Strike one.

[quote name='thrustbucket']

You've spent far longer in these forums demonstrating how little you know about pretty much everything, so you first?
But if you at least made a good point for every three personal attacks you made, you might be on less people's ignore list.
[/QUOTE]

[quote name='Msut77']Oh yeah thrust, I remember all the incredibly insightful comments you made in the various healthcare threads.

No sorry, that isn't true because you made no worthwhile posts in a year long thread.[/quote]
 
[quote name='BigT']That's way too simple ;) ... we have to start throwing out various vague economic references to show that printing money out of thin air and spending it ad libitum is a good thing.[/quote]
But that's not Keynesian economics. The goal posts are moving here. And that's the problem. Now anything anybody doesn't like is either socialism, Keynesian, or "progressive" (ooooooooOOOOOOOOOOooooooo progressive).

Keynesians are really pissed off, Thrust. I'm really pissed off. Msut and Myke are really pissed off. We've just been saddled with a shit conservative financial response. Conservative Bernanke and Conservative Bush and Conservative Paulson and Conservative Geithner and Conservative Summers decide to open the treasury and save their buddies. Moderate Obama either has no spine or believes these people. Then someone remembers Keynesians would spend during a recession and suddenly the response is a Keynesian one.

Keynesian economics in a nutshell, as told by Aesop.
In a field one summer's day a grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. A group of ants walked by, grunting as they struggled to carry plump kernels of corn.

"Where are you going with those heavy things?" asked the grasshopper.

Without stopping, the first ant replied, "To our ant hill. This is the third kernel I've delivered today."

"Why not come and sing with me," teased the grasshopper, "instead of working so hard?"


"We are helping to store food for the winter," said the ant, "and think you should do the same."

"Winter is far away and it is a glorious day to play," sang the grasshopper.

But the ants went on their way and continued their hard work.

The weather soon turned cold. All the food lying in the field was covered with a thick white blanket of snow that even the grasshopper could not dig through. Soon the grasshopper found itself dying of hunger.

He staggered to the ants' hill and saw them handing out corn from the stores they had collected in the summer. He begged them for something to eat.

"What!" cried the ants in surprise, "haven't you stored anything away for the winter? What in the world were you doing all last summer?"

"I didn't have time to store any food," complained the grasshopper; "I was so busy playing music that before I knew it the summer was gone."

The ants shook their heads in disgust, turned their backs on the grasshopper and went on with their work.
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Ireland slashed its budget and is still hurting. They didn't save in the good times, they cut taxes like crazy. Not Keynesian policy. Exactly the opposite.

Greece spent like drunk sailors in the good times. Then slashed in the bad times. The anti-Keynesian response, almost perfected. And look how great they're doing.

America. Cut taxes and slashed government income every minute of Bush's presidency. Opened the treasury in the bad times. Ok, sort of Keynesian? But then give it to the richest? WTF? DEFINITELY not Keynesian.

China. Saves during the bad time. Spends to promote jobs during the leaner times. Preyed on the grasshopper spending during the good times. Not only creating jobs, but creating huge rail systems that are bleeding edge. Anyone betting on how long before they're exporting what is obviously the world's primary transportation spending area for the next century? Win-win-win.

But people will still bullshit and say Bernanke is a Keynesian. So let's ask the most ridiculously partisan source we can find. Let's make sure it's from 1993, so they wouldn't have a reason to lie (since the crash hadn't happened yet). Let's ask the Freepers.

Ben Bernanke is no Keynesian
 
Remember speed.

All you get in response is an LOL or you get called womanly,
Because being knowledgeable is for pussy willows.
.

Then we get blamed for being mean.
 
So, "Keynesianism" hasn't failed because we've had no true Keynesianism policy?

Then, likewise, the free market hasn't failed because we've had no true free market.

It'd be nice if everyone would stop blaming all the woes on the free market
 
I doubt anyone here has actually read keynes' work and not some second or third handed interpretation but myself. If any of you keynes supporters actually had, you would have seen he provides no proof of his reasoning except for a superficial empirical pattern which never holds up (and sometimes contradicts himself); time and time again on each of his mistaken theories he can be proven wrong. It is astounding how this fabric of fallacies has persisted in public conscious, the media, and government for so long. I blame the public school system.
 
[quote name='UncleBob']So, "Keynesianism" hasn't failed because we've had no true Keynesianism policy?[/quote]
It's a two part idea. The first is that we save for the recession. Even children's tales are written about that. Nothing controversial there. Then when it hits, we create jobs via massive projects that will cut costs for business and government when we boom again. Available labor is cheaper and of a higher quality. So we take the down time of a recession to do things like retrofit every bridge in America (allowing for things like larger trucks, which = lower costs of transportation), redo sewer and water systems (keeping disease at bay), etc.

There's nothing hard or crazy to understand in Keynesian policy. It's common sense.
Then, likewise, the free market hasn't failed because we've had no true free market.
Click to expand...
We've had pieces of Keynesian policy before and it's almost always worked. The Hoover Dam is the ultimate Keynesian project. It put thousands of people to work for 5 years and has created an average of 4.2 Terawatt (!?!) hours of electricity per year since completion in 1936. That's a winner no matter how you slice it. Now the businesses in 5 surrounding states are paying less for power. Maybe they'll hire workers with that freed up capital?

The problem is you can't go Keynesian if you haven't saved during the good years. The grasshopper can't just start shitting food in the winter.

Keynesians have generally figured out that the two best types of projects (the ones that employ the most while returning the best value) are energy and transportation. That's why you see things like this from Keynesians. And if they end up engineering a technology that they can export, then they've just moved up the value chain and can compete with top tier thinking economy countries (USA, Germany) for the real money. Win-win-win.
It'd be nice if everyone would stop blaming all the woes on the free market
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Keynesians and free marketeers can coexist. Keynesians want free markets, it makes them more efficient. The problem is free marketers don't want to be Keynesians until the economy sucks. The joke is that everyone's a Keynesian in the foxhole.
 
[quote name='speedracer']The joke is that everyone's a Keynesian in the foxhole.[/QUOTE]

:rofl:

Do you folks remember the Minneapolis bridge collapse of 2007?

I remember reports saying bridges going over the Ohio River in Cincinnati were 'structurally unsound'. That was in 2008, and they were vastly in need of repair. No movement on repairing them since then; evidently, they're standing, so that means they're ok.

Think of the problems that would be solved by seeing the NJ->NYC tunnel. (not funny stuff, like the problems of all those New Jersey people having access to your neighborhood.) Issues of transit, of jobs - of meaning that we'd be improving the Lincoln Tunnel and making it easier to get to the city for the first time since 1934!

But Chris Christie doesn't think so, as he just killed the project. Now, not building a tunnel is somewhat benign compared to what can happen when, say, repairs aren't done on a bridge. Next time you see a bridge collapse, you can thank Jebus, because it means Keynesians weren't in charge. That's more important than some crummy ol' *infrastructure*, isn't it?
 
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