Lars P. Syll

The flawed premises of mainstream​ economic theory You know, and I know, that we do not live in a world of Econs. We live in a world of Humans. And since most economists are also human, they also know that they do not live in a world of Econs … Nevertheless, this model of economic behavior based on a population consisting only of Econs has flourished, raising economics to that pinnacle of influence on which it now rests. Critiques over the years have been...

Paul Ryan’s ‘eat cake’ moment​​ In his now infamous deleted tweet Paul Ryan defended the new corporate tax cuts by noting that not only corporations benefitted, but also ordinary workers that now may increase their wages by $1.50 — per week. Makes yours truly come to think of one of the most famous quotes in history, where French queen Marie-Antoinette in 1789 told the hungering masses that if they didn’t have enough bread, well “eat cake” …...

28 Jahre, zwei Monate und 27 Tage  [embedded content] Am 5. Februar gibt es die Mauer genauso lange nicht mehr, wie sie einst existierte. Das ist das Ende einer Epoche. Und auch ein Anfang … Wenn ich heute die Bilder von damals sehe, merke ich: Gefühle lassen sich nicht nur nicht messen, sie haben auch kein Alter. Gefühle werden nicht alt. Ich bin oft noch zu Tränen gerührt und schäme mich trotzdem dafür. Ich müsste längst abgeklärter sein. Doch jenes...

Hur skiljer man på vetenskap och trams? Emma Frans’ med rätta prisbelönta bok Larmrapporten är en rolig, kunnig och ack så nödvändig uppgörelse med allehanda pseudo-vetenskapligt trams som sköljer över oss i media nuförtiden. Inte minst i sociala media sprids en massa ‘alternativa fakta’ och nonsens. Även om jag varmt rekommederat studenter, vänner och bekanta att läsa boken, kan jag dock inte låta bli att här påpeka att det finns en liten svaghet i boken....

It is better to be unhappy Socrates than a happy pig  [embedded content] Advertisements

Modern economics — confusing models with reality What does concern me about my discipline … is that its current core — by which I mainly mean the so-called dynamic stochastic general equilibrium approach — has become so mesmerized with its own internal logic that it has begun to confuse the precision it has achieved about its own world with the precision that it has about the real one … While it often makes sense to assume rational expectations for a...

Vinsttak löser inga som helst problem i svensk skola Sverige har blivit extremt. Extremt i fråga om offentlig finansiering av vinstdrivande skolföretag. Och extremt, om vi ska tro Pisa, bland OECD-länder vad gäller växande kunskapsklyftor. Det är lätt att förstå varför inget annat land har övervägt att kopiera oss. Den enda ledande politiker som jag har hört uttrycka sympati för den svenska skolmodellen är Donald Trumps utbildningsminister. Det faktum att...

Economics’ pretence of knowledge While in the physical sciences the investigator will be able to measure what, on the basis of a prima facie theory, he thinks important, in the social sciences often is treated as important that which happens to be accessible to measurement. This is sometimes carried to the point where it is demanded that our theories must be formulated in such terms that they refer only to measurable magnitudes. It can hardly be denied that...

Analysis of covariance (student stuff)  [embedded content] Advertisements

It’s high time to bury Milton Friedman’s natural rate hypotheis Fifty years ago Milton Friedman wrote an (in)famous article arguing that (1) the natural rate of unemployment was independent of monetary policy and that (2) trying to keep the unemployment rate below the natural rate would only give rise to higher and higher inflation. The hypothesis has always been controversial, and much theoretical and empirical work has questioned the real-world relevance...