Ramanan — Ashwani Saith: Ajit Singh Of Cambridge And Chandigarh – An Intellectual Biography Of The Radical Sikh Economist

Apt Kaldor quote, giving Singh advice on development economics.

The Case for Concerted Action
Ashwani Saith: Ajit Singh Of Cambridge And Chandigarh – An Intellectual Biography Of The Radical Sikh Economist
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — Labour Day!

Nicholas Kaldor on how neoliberalism weakened labour power.

Happy Labor Day to all those that don't have a passive income from portfolio investment. You are the people that get it done.

The Case for Concerted Action
Labour Day!
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — Mainstream Economics Compared To Keynesian Times

Nicholas Kaldor quote.

The Case for Concerted Action
Mainstream Economics Compared To Keynesian Times
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — Joan Robinson And Nicholas Kaldor On Antagonism To Keynesian Ideas

Some good quotations.

The Case for Concerted Action
Joan Robinson And Nicholas Kaldor On Antagonism To Keynesian Ideas
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — More Free Trade Orthodoxies

Nice post on trade, citing Joan Robinson and Nicholas Kaldor.

The Case for Concerted Action
More Free Trade Orthodoxies
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — Anthony Thirlwall On How He Became A Kaldorian

Some  links.

The Case for Concerted Action
Anthony Thirlwall On How He Became A Kaldorian
V. Ramanan

Barkley Rosser — How I Came To No Longer Be A Kaldorian Economist

Of interest to Kaldorians, Post Keynesians, and modern monetary theorists (MMT).

Econospeak
How I Came To No Longer Be A Kaldorian Economist
J. Barkley Rosser | Professor of Economics and Business Administration James Madison University

Ramanan — A New Way To Learn Economics?

Ramanan comments on CORE Econ.

The Case for Concerted Action
A New Way To Learn Economics?
V. Ramanan

Robert Skidelsky — Stylised Facts

As I came to develop a deeper understanding of economics, I became increasingly convinced that Kaldor’s approach was the only way to prevent economics ossifying into pure formalism. “Stylised facts” was his methodological weapon, and I can do no better than quote from his essay “Capital Accumulation and Economic Growth” (1961), with its strongly implied attack on the neoclassical approach to model construction:

“We all agree that the basic requirement of any model is that it should be capable of explaining the characteristic features of the economic process as we find them in reality. It is no good starting off a model with the kind of abstraction which initially excludes the influence of forces which are mainly responsible for the behaviour of the economic variables under investigation; and on finding that the theory leads to results contrary to what we observe in reality, attributing this contrary movement to the compensating (or more than compensating) influence of residual factors that have been assumed away in the model.

Any theory must necessarily be based on abstractions; but the type of abstraction chosen cannot be decided in a vacuum. ... Hence the theorist, in choosing a particular theoretical approach, ought to start off with a summary of the facts which he regards as relevant to his problem. Since facts, as recorded by statisticians, are always subject to numerous snags and qualifications, and for that reason are incapable of being accurately summarised, the theorist, in my view, should be free to start with a ‘stylized’ view of the facts – i.e. concentrate on broad tendencies, ignoring individual detail, and proceed on the ‘as if’ method, i.e. construct a hypothesis that could account for these ‘stylized’ facts, without necessarily committing himself on the historical accuracy, or sufficiency, of the facts or tendencies thus summarized” (177–178).

In my opinion, the stylised facts approach stands up pretty well to the criticisms that have been made against it.

Skidelsky goes on to explain Kaldor's use of stylized facts as being derived from a combination of historical data and intuition in reasoning to the best explanation. This is called "abduction" although Skidelsky doesn't use the term.

This post is  a should-read for those interested in Keynesian and Post Keynesian economics. There are many more good points Skidelsky brings out.

Robert Skidelsky's blog
Stylised Facts
Robert Skidelsky | Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick
Acta Oeconomica, Vol. 67 (S), pp. 31–35 (2017)

Ramanan — Article 50 To Be Triggered. Nicky Kaldor Would Have Been Happy

Kaldor quote.

The Case for Concerted Action
Article 50 To Be Triggered. Nicky Kaldor Would Have Been Happy
V. Ramanan

Jo Michell — Thoughts on the NAIRU

If you are following this.

Critical Macro Finance

Thoughts on the NAIRU
Jo Michell

Lord Keynes — Kaldor’s Growth Laws and Verdoorn’s Law: An Overview and Bibliography

More for your reference file.

Social Democracy For The 21St Century: A Post Keynesian Perspective

Kaldor’s Growth Laws and Verdoorn’s Law: An Overview and Bibliography
Lord Keynes

V. Ramanan — The World Needs A Kaldorian Response

Before the crisis, the economics profession believed in two orthodoxies:

1. crude version of Monetarism, which treats the stock of money as exogenous and also claims that fiscal policy is impotent.
2. free trade.

While policy response following the 2008 crisis have made economists realize that the first orthodoxy is wrong, they are yet to realize the orthodoxy of the second. As Joan Robinson said in her 1973 article, The Need For A Reconsideration Of The Theory Of International Trade, “there is no branch of economics in which there is a wider gap between orthodox doctrine and actual problems than in the theory of international trade”. The recent consensus of the economics profession on the debate about the UK EU referendum highlights it. Instead of the invisible hand, we need a visible hand, i.e., a coordination at the international level. The leftist response as highlighted by Dani Rodrik are welcome but still leave the problem open. So one needs both this and a world-wide fiscal expansion with balance-of-payments targets.

The Case for Concerted Action
The World Needs A Kaldorian Response
V. Ramanan

Ramanan — Nicholas Kaldor On The Foreign Trade Multiplier

Kaldor quote.

The Case for Concerted Action
Nicholas Kaldor On The Foreign Trade Multiplier
V. Ramanan

Gerald Friedman responds to Christina and David Romer

The Romers, and I suppose other neoclassical macro economists, believe that the economy tends towards full employment equilibrium and will move there on its own without need for government intervention or stimulus. They would acknowledge that following a negative shock, government stimulus spending may accelerate the recovery somewhat, as Bernstein and Romer in 2009 anticipated the Obama stimulus would speed recovery by about 6 months. They deny, however, that stimulus spending could change the permanent level of output because the economy will on its own return to full employment at a capacity output set without regard to the level of employment by factor endowments, by preferences, and by the level of exogenous technology. From this perspective, because a period of prolonged measured slow growth cannot be caused by involuntary unemployment, it must, by a priori assumption, be due to a decline in the exogenously determined growth rate in capacity. Like mosquitos on an otherwise delightful summer afternoon, slow growth is unfortunate but there is little that can safely be done about it.

Or maybe we can find safe pesticides. Here I agree with John Maynard Keynes that the economy can have a low-employment equilibrium because of a lack of effective demand, and I agree with Nicholas Kaldor and Petrus Verdoorn that productivity and the growth rate of capacity can be increased by policies that push the economy to a higher level of employment. And to the contrary, periods of prolonged unemployment and underutilization of capacity can lower capacity by discouraging workers and reducing the incentive to invest, to innovate, and to raise productivity. Unfortunately, this is what has been happening in the US for the last few years; and, fortunately, there is reason to believe following Keynes/Kaldor/Verdoorn that policy can reverse this decline by pushing the economy to a higher level of output and thus a higher level of productivity….

Gerald Friedman responds to Christina and David Romer

Bill Mitchell — Balance of payments constraints

The late Canadian economist Harry Johnson, who came at the subject from the Monetarist persuasion, was correct when he wrote in 1969 (reference below) that “The adoption of flexible exchange rates would have the great advantage of freeing governments to use their instruments of domestic policy for the pursuit of domestic objectives, while at the same time removing the pressures to intervene in international trade and payments for balance-of-payments reasons.” How does this square with those who believe that even currency-issuing governments are constrained in their fiscal flexibility by an alleged balance of payments constraint. So-called progressive economists, particularly, are enamoured with the idea that Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is flawed because it doesn’t recognise the fiscal limits imposed by the need to maintain a stable external balance. In this blog, we trace the arguments.…

The post everyone has been waiting for.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Balance of payments constraints
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Ramanan responded in the comments here at MNE and developed his argument in a separate post. With "free trade" to the fore these days owing to the flurry of new trade agreements, this is a debate worth having.

The Case for Concerted Action
Neochartalism, Balance Of Payments And Mainstream Economics
V. Ramanan

My view is that there is a political dimension to trade as well as an economic one. Economics focuses in efficiencies such as comparative advantage. But from the political point of view, as well as engineering, efficiency about means and effectiveness is about goals. Efficiency serves effectiveness. This means that efficiency must be balanced with resilience.

A balance must be struck between autarchy and dependence, for example. In addition, history testifies that more growth of developed countries is benefitted by so-called free trade, whereas the growth of emerging countries has been enhanced by protecting infant industries. This was the case between Britain and the US in the 19th century, for example.

Ramanan — Kaldor And Oil

Kaldor quote.

The Case For Concerted Action
Kaldor And Oil

V. Ramanan

Ramanan — The Kaldor-Verdoorn Effect

Anyway, to conclude, cheering for productivity is not going to help the world economy. The solution is to increase production: productivity will rise when production rises. The standard story as told in Mankiw’s textbook is erroneous.

Mankiw has the causality reversed.

The Case of Concerted Action
The Kaldor-Verdoorn Effect
Ramanan

Ramanan — Free Trade? Heterodox Dissent

Useful quotes from Joan Robinson and Wynne Godley. Definitely keepers.

The Case For Concerted Action
Free Trade? Heterodox Dissent
Ramanan

Lars P. Syll — Nicholas Kaldor on putting the cart before the horse fallacy

Also called the "wagging the dog's tail" fallacy.

Keeper quote that turning out to be true in spades.

Lars P. Syll’s Blog

Nicholas Kaldor on putting the cart before the horse fallacy

Lars P. Syll | Professor, Malmo University