Economics

Archive for Economics

Dr. Freud, Dr. Krugman. Dr. Krugman, Dr. Freud

Earlier today I was fascinated by the blatant contradiction in this post from Krugman: There are many lists now circulating of the biggest winners and losers from the election; oddly, however, none of the lists I’ve seen mentions just how bad this result is for Wall Street’s Masters of the Universe. The story, as you […]

How Chris Christie’s License Plate Scheme Adds Insult to Injury

[UPDATE: Actually, I am not sure the below is relevant, after thinking it through some more. What I will defend is the statement that if we had a long period of price ceilings, with new gasoline supplies being brought into the region but where the demand consistently were higher than the available quantity supplied, and […]

Econ 101 Works! Price Controls Cause Gas Lines

I can’t believe I had to write this up, but there were a surprising number of people who thought it was a right-wing myth to claim that it was the price controls causing gas lines, rather than the hurricane. An excerpt, and note that I make a point about stockpiling beforehand that I haven’t seen […]

The System Is Rigged: The Futility of Politics

[Such is the title of my article in the October issue of the Lara-Murphy Report (sample issues and subscription info here). This month we interview Dr. Murray Sabrin, who–among other things–is Professor of Finance at Ramapo College of New Jersey, is producing a documentary on the 100th anniversary of the Fed, ran for governor of […]

Krugman Explains That a Bogus Alien Invasion Would End Recession in 18 Months

Sometimes I wonder about the fate of the Austro-libertarian movement. In what I thought would be such a crystal clear post that even Matt Yglesias would personally call and apologize, I made the case that anyone who thought a bogus alien invasion would be better than the status quo, would also think a suitable hurricane […]

One More Attempt to Understand Aliens vs. Hurricanes

I am completely unsatisfied with the responses in the comments of my previous post. Let’s try this again. I’m going to use numbers. Please answer me with respect to the numerical examples provided. If you want to step outside my thought experiment and tell me why it’s unfair, missing the point, etc. etc., that’s fine, […]

“Hurricanes Are Nature’s Keynesianism”

I didn’t choose that title for my latest article at The American Conservative–it’s a bit too provocative for my tastes–but I don’t think it’s out of line. I don’t see why our Keynesian friends here (and even in the comments of my article) bristle so much at linking the two. Look at this earlier piece […]

Did Matt Yglesias Just Refute Keynes and Krugman?

It used to be the case that after a natural disaster, we could expect the following: 1) Pundits and even some economists would say that despite the human tragedy, the silver lining was that the disaster would be “good for the economy.” Then, due to the efforts of Henry Hazlitt, it used to be the […]