The Slog
Milton Friedman (left)
would’ve been a hundred years old today, and all over the Western
world, people who worship him, and use his quotes ad nauseam – but never
talk about the consequences of his ‘ideas’ in the real world – are
writing hagiographic guff about his influence. What follows is one from
the Slog archives – even more relevant today – about the stifling
idolatry applied to the likes of Marx, Keynes, and Friedman…none of whom
knew about Libor rigging, speed of light trading, Russian market
blagging, Ebay, eurozone meltdown, Northern Rock, gold price
manipulation, intrabank online swindles, and a thousand other ‘free
market’ atrocities.
There was an interesting piece in the New York Times recently (where else?) by Paul Krugman, in which he rather oddly argued on the side of the bankers (“there isn’t a structural problem really”) to make the following liberal (“let’s spend our way out of trouble”) point:
‘All of this strongly suggests that we’re suffering not from the teething pains of some kind of structural transition that must gradually run its course, but rather from an overall lack of sufficient demand — the kind of lack that could and should be cured quickly with government programs designed to boost spending.’
It’s the same one-dimensional thinking that could just as easily be applied to Merkel, Schäuble, and the 1922 Committee in its insistence on more and more cuts to services, and tax cuts for those with money to spend: it’s all about demand. But even more depressing is Krugman’s example as to how this sort of return to growth can be achieved: an article written in June 1939 saying the same thing as those (like me) who argue there is a structural problem with the model of capitalism we’re using:
….is dead. So is Marx. So is Keynes. None of them are relevant to the New Future. It is time fiscal economics moved on.
Milton Friedman (left)
would’ve been a hundred years old today, and all over the Western
world, people who worship him, and use his quotes ad nauseam – but never
talk about the consequences of his ‘ideas’ in the real world – are
writing hagiographic guff about his influence. What follows is one from
the Slog archives – even more relevant today – about the stifling
idolatry applied to the likes of Marx, Keynes, and Friedman…none of whom
knew about Libor rigging, speed of light trading, Russian market
blagging, Ebay, eurozone meltdown, Northern Rock, gold price
manipulation, intrabank online swindles, and a thousand other ‘free
market’ atrocities.There was an interesting piece in the New York Times recently (where else?) by Paul Krugman, in which he rather oddly argued on the side of the bankers (“there isn’t a structural problem really”) to make the following liberal (“let’s spend our way out of trouble”) point:
‘All of this strongly suggests that we’re suffering not from the teething pains of some kind of structural transition that must gradually run its course, but rather from an overall lack of sufficient demand — the kind of lack that could and should be cured quickly with government programs designed to boost spending.’
It’s the same one-dimensional thinking that could just as easily be applied to Merkel, Schäuble, and the 1922 Committee in its insistence on more and more cuts to services, and tax cuts for those with money to spend: it’s all about demand. But even more depressing is Krugman’s example as to how this sort of return to growth can be achieved: an article written in June 1939 saying the same thing as those (like me) who argue there is a structural problem with the model of capitalism we’re using:
