I simply can’t let Krugman [ht: br] get away with writing off a large part of contemporary economic discourse (not to mention of the history of economic thought) and with his declaration that Larry Summers has “laid down what amounts to a very radical manifesto” (not to mention the fact that I was forced to waste the better part of a quarter of an hour this morning listening to Summers’s talk in honor of Stanley Fischer at the IMF Economic Forum, during which he announces that he’s finally discovered the possibility that the current level of economic stagnation may persist for some time).
Krugman may want to curse Summers out of professional jealousy. Me, I want to curse the lot of them—not only the MIT family but mainstream economists generally—for their utter cluelessness when it comes to making sense of (and maybe, eventually, actually doing something about) the current crises of capitalism....
So, what is he up to? Basically, Krugman showers Summers in lavish praise for his belated, warmed-over, and barely intelligible argument that attains what little virtue it has about the economic challenges we face right now by vaguely resembling the most rudimentary aspects of what people who read and build on the ideas of Marx, Kalecki, Minsky, and others have been saying and writing for years.
Occasional Links & Commentary
All in the family
David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame
All in the family
David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame
4 comments:
"They talk as if it’s only their academic reputations that are on the line. But we can’t forget there are millions and millions of people, young and old, whose lives hang in the balance"
Right. Many in the academe only seem interested in change to the extent that their part of the academe is vindicated within the academe along the way...
rsp,
I knew it! See the chart in Prof. Ruccio's post: Mr. Bean was Rudiger Dornbusch's student!
Before his death in 2002, Rudiger Dornbusch liked to lecture Brazil on the supposed "mistake" the country had made by not following Argentina's 1990s decision to create a dollar-based currency board.
Well, we now all know how the experience ended in Argentina.
This also says much about the value of Dornbusch's input as an economist. The guy lived in cuckoo cloud land, simply disconnected from the real world.
Krugman & Co. — totally flabbergasting neoclassical apologetics-Lars P Syll
http://larspsyll.wordpress.com/2013/11/18/krugman-co-totally-flabbergasting-neoclassical-apologetics/
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