Lars P. Syll

Stjärnorna kvittar det lika (personal)  [embedded content]  [embedded content] In loving memory of my mother. Nils Ferlin was her favourite poet. div{float:left;margin-right:10px;} div.wpmrec2x div.u > div:nth-child(3n){margin-right:0px;} ]]> Advertisements

What kind of realist am I? Some commentators on this blog seem to be of the opinion that since yours truly is critical of mainstream economics and ask for more relevance and realism I’m bound to be a “naive” realist or empiricist. Nothing could be further from the truth! In a time when scientific relativism is expanding, it is important to keep up the claim for not reducing science to a pure discursive level. We have to maintain the Enlightenment tradition...

So in what sense is this “dynamic stochastic general equilibrium” model firmly grounded in the principles of economic theory? I do not want to be misunderstood. Friends have reminded me that much of the effort of “modern macro” goes into the incorporation of important deviations from the Panglossian assumptions that underlie the simplistic application of the Ramsey model to positive macroeconomics. Research focuses on the implications of wage and price stickiness, gaps and...

The Rule of 72 A fast way of finding an approximative answer to what time it takes for e.g. a country’s income to double when the income grows at x percent per year. [embedded content] div{float:left;margin-right:10px;} div.wpmrec2x div.u > div:nth-child(3n){margin-right:0px;} ]]> Advertisements

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Harvard economist and George Bush advisor Greg Mankiw is one of many mainstream economists who has been appealing to the education variable to explain the rising inequality we have seen for the last 30 years in both the US and elsewhere in Western societies. Writes Mankiw: Even if the income gains are in the top 1 percent, why does that imply that the right story is not about education?… If indeed a year of schooling guaranteed you precisely a 10 percent increase in earnings,...

Yours truly has a reputation for being tough on grading students. It is true. I am tough. And for a reason. Economics is hard. Getting a grade in it is not something you have a right to. You have to show that you master the material. You have to earn it! [embedded content] div{float:left;margin-right:10px;} div.wpmrec2x div.u > div:nth-child(3n){margin-right:0px;} ]]> Advertisements

Economics textbooks transmogrifying truth — wages and unemployment A couple of weeks ago yours truly was sent a copy of the new edition of Chad Jones intermediate textbook Macroeconomics (4th ed, W W Norton, 2018). There’s much in the book I like, e. g. Jones’  combining of more traditional short-run macroeconomic analysis with an accessible coverage of the Romer model — the foundation of modern growth theory — and DSGE business cycle models. Unfortunately...

Labour’s manifesto — not continued austerity — is what the UK needs On 8 June, voters will go to the polls for perhaps the most important UK general election since 1945. The importance arises in great part from profound differences in economic policy, reflecting different views of the nature and health of the British economy. The Conservative manifesto calls for continued austerity, which will tend to slow the economy at a crucial juncture, against the...

‘Cauchy logic’ in economics What is 0.999 …, really? Is it 1? Or is it some number infinitesimally less than 1? The right answer is to unmask the question. What is 0.999 …, really? It appears to refer to a kind of sum: .9 + + 0.09 + 0.009 + 0.0009 + … But what does that mean? That pesky ellipsis is the real problem. There can be no controversy about what it means to add up two, or three, or a hundred numbers. But infinitely many? That’s a different story....