Real-World Economics Review

from David Ruccio Mainstream economics presents quite a spectacle these days. It has no real theory of the firm and, even now, more than nine years after the Great Recession began, its most cherished claim to relevance—the use of large-scale forecasting models of the economy that assume people always behave rationally—is still misleading policymakers. As if that weren’t embarrassing enough, we now have a leading mainstream economist, Havard’s Martin Feldstein, claiming that the “official...

from Lars Syll Scientific progress … is frequently the result of observation that something does work, which runs far ahead of any understanding of why it works. Not within the economics profession. There, deductive reasoning based on logical inference from a specific set of a priori deductions is “exactly the right way to do things”. What is absurd is not the use of the deductive method but the claim to exclusivity made for it. This debate is not simply about mathematics versus poetry....

from Jayati Ghosh There is a lot of buzz globally around the idea of a Universal Basic Income (or UBI). It is perceived as one way of coping with technology-induced unemployment that is projected to grow significantly in the near future, as well as reducing inequalities and increasing consumption demand in stagnant economies. Certainly there is much to be said for the idea, especially if it is to be achieved by taxing the rich and particularly those activities that are either socially...

from Dean Baker Ever since Donald Trump was elected there has been a huge backlash among elite-types against those blaming trade for their problems. Major news outlets have been filled with misleading and dishonest stories claiming that the real cause of manufacturing job loss has been automation and that people are stupid to worry about trade. In fact, people are exactly right to be concerned about the impact of our trade policies on their living standards. It is the fact that people are...

from David Ruccio Apparently, the latest attempt to redefine the role of economists is to encourage them to be plumbers. Maybe it’s just my age but, when I read plumbers, I immediately think of the covert Special Investigations Unit in the Nixon White House—the operation that began with attempting to stop the leak of classified information (such as the Pentagon Papers) and then branched into illegal activities while working for the Committee to Re-elect the President (including the...

from Peter Radford There I said it. There comes a point when we all have to stop banging our heads against the wall and just step back. Why, we ask in such moments, are we wasting our time? The wall is immoveable. It is indifferent to our efforts. It is solid. It has the appearance of permanence. It just won’t shift. So walk away. Do something else. In the case of economics go and study the economy instead. Too many people are wasting far too much time talking about economists as if they...

I’m working a bit on (multi-factor) productivity at the moment. Part of this endeavour is taking a hard look at the details which, in my case, means taking a hard look at the productivity of cows (over the long haul). How did farmers, studbooks, veterinarians, (cooperative) factories and the government together manage to increase the productivity of cows? This is not just about the fat content of milk and yields per cow but also about quality improvement, which I operationalize as the...

According to the most recent updates, the Oroville dam in California (the highest dam in the USA) might be on the point of collapsing (more precisely: the emergency overflow might collapse). According to Piet Dircke, an engineer of Arcadis (which since 2010 is involved with Californian watermanagement in the San Fransisco-Stockton-Sacramento triangle) there is one overriding reason why this might happen: failing maintenance maintenance. “The overflow should have been replaced 10 years...

Lina Kahn wrote an excellent totally Veblenian analysis of Amazone and anti-trust policies. Or: why Chicago style price based anti-trust analysis does not work and we have to look at the nature and structure of the brave new internet markets. “Journal of Economic Issues: 50th Anniversary Editor’s Choice Collection”. Until 10 march: ungated. Quite a bit about the nature and structure of markets. According to the ECB their QE policy was an astounding success. It got Southern European...

from Lars Syll There was an unusual degree of consensus among economists about what would happen if Britain voted for Brexit in the referendum on June 23 last year. The language used by the International Monetary Fund was typical: It expressed fears of an “abrupt reaction,” adding that this “may have already begun” … What happened instead was that Britain enjoyed the best growth of any major advanced economy in 2016 … Andy Haldane compared the pitfalls of economic prediction to the single...