Lars P. Syll

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Låt mig få tända ett ljus [embedded content] Jag tänder ett ljus för dig också. Siv Pettersson (1955-1975). RIP.

 [embedded content] Great lecture by one of my favourite philosophers of science. Among other things, Nancy Cartwright underscores the problem many ‘randomistas’ end up with when underestimating heterogeneity and interaction is not only an external validity problem when trying to ‘export’ regression results to different times or different target populations. It is also often an internal problem to the millions of regression estimates that economists produce every year....

One of the most beautiful results of probability theory is Markov’s inequality (after the Russian mathematician Andrei Markov (1856-1922)): If X is a non-negative stochastic variable (X ≥ 0) with a finite expectation value E(X), then for every a > 0 P{X ≥ a} ≤ E(X)/a If the production of cars in a factory during a week is assumed to be a stochastic variable with an expectation value (mean) of 50 units, we can – based on nothing else but the inequality – conclude that the...

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 [embedded content] This live performance remains unequalled to this day. Jussi Björling — the greatest of them all.

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RBC models — willfully silly obscurantism As a result of the three waves of new classical economics, the field of macroeconomics became increasingly rigorous and increasingly tied to the tools of microeconomics. The real business cycle models were specific, dynamic examples of Arrow–Debreu general equilibrium theory. Indeed, this was one of their main selling points. Over time, proponents of this work have backed away from the assumption that the business...

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The sickening market-driven society The market was meant to emancipate us, offering autonomy and freedom. Instead it has delivered atomisation and loneliness. The workplace has been overwhelmed by a mad, Kafkaesque infrastructure of assessments, monitoring, measuring, surveillance and audits, centrally directed and rigidly planned, whose purpose is to reward the winners and punish the losers. It destroys autonomy, enterprise, innovation and loyalty, and...