Lars P. Syll

Orbáns Ungarn: die Wut der Europäer kommt zu spät Na endlich! Alle die seit Jahren meinen, die EU müsse dem “kleinen Diktator” Viktor Orban die rote Karte zeigen, kamen am Donnerstag auf ihre Kosten. Es war wie auf dem Schulhof, wo sich nach Jahren der Nichteinmischung die Mehrheit endlich den herrschenden Rowdy vornimmt und ihn nach allen Regeln der Kunst zerlegt … Bloß wo waren sie denn früher? Etwa Mark Rutte mit seinem starken Spruch, dass so ein Land...

Stefan Löfven borde veta hut På gårdagens presskonferens — då vår statsminister meddelade sin avgång — upprepade Stefan Löfven flera gånger att det var Vänsterpartiets fel att han tvingats till detta, trots att Socialdemokraterna enligt Löfven gått Vänsterpartiet till mötes (oh ja och på julafton kommer tomten) när det gällde konflikten kring marknadshyror. Och detta ankors plask och grodors plums tror Löfven att han kan lura i oss. Man tar sig för pannan!...

Randomizations creating illusions of knowledge The advantage of randomised experiments in describing populations creates an illusion of knowledge … This happens because of the propensity of scientific journals to value so-called causal findings and not to value findings where no (so-called) causality is found. In brief, it is arguable that we know less than we think we do. To see this, suppose—as is indeed the case in reality—that thousands of researchers...

En gigant har gått ur tiden .[embedded content] Peps Persson 1946-2021.

L’Afrique du Sud — le pays le plus inégalitaire au monde .[embedded content]

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What does randomisation guarantee? Nothing! Does not randomization somehow or other guarantee (or perhaps, much more plausibly, provide the nearest thing that we can have to a guarantee) that any possible links to … outcome, aside from the link to treatment …, are broken? Although he does not explicitly make this claim, and although there are issues about how well it sits with his own technical programme, this seems to me the only way in which Pearl...

‘New Keynesian’ macroeconomics — worse than useless Mainstream macroeconomics can only progress if it gets rid of the DSGE albatross around its neck. It is better to do it now than to wait for another 20 years because the question is not whether but when DSGE modeling will be discarded. DSGE modeling is a story of a death foretold … Getting rid of DSGE models is critical because the hegemonic DSGE program is crowding out alternative macro methodologies...

Economics — a science in need of a paradigm shift The methodology and ideology of modern economics are built into the frameworks of educational methods, and absorbed by students without any explicit discussion. In particular, the logical positivist philosophy is a deadly poison which I ingested during my Ph.D. training at the Economics Department in Stanford in the late 1970s. It took me years and years to undo these effects … Modern economics is much like...

Orban’s Hungary — a shame for all of Europe .[embedded content]