Bryan Caplan

I am reading Caplan's "The Myth of the Rational Voter".

I am interested in hearing what other people here have to say about Bryan Caplan.

Thanks! 

 > I am interested in hearing what other people here have to say about Bryan Caplan.

 Fine. I most always have material I'd rather spend the time reading. I can't read

everything and what I've read by Caplan has not caused me to return. YMMV. 

 

I think the Myth of the Rational Voter is a great read and I think it sums up the problem with hyper democracy which we presently face. Other then that I know he disagrees with Austrian economics because he thinks that if the Fed was responsible for the business cycle then business should be able to predict these cycles and overcome it. Overall I think his is dead on in that democracy needs to be curbed HARDCORE. He seems to support supermajority requirements for legislatures (something that severly limits simple numerical majorities from getting their way) and increased use of judicial review of legislation (such as in the lochner era Supreme Court). I believe (though I might be wrong) that he is an anarcho-capitalist but as far as improving the flawed institution of government he supports certain temporary measures to curb poor legislation from harming individuals.

Here is a link to Bryan Caplan's critique of the Austrian business Cycle: http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2008/01/whats_wrong_wit_6.html

Here is an Austrian response to his view point: http://www.mises.org/story/2673

I think he's good on some things, but he seems arrogantly dismissive of Austrianism. One must wonder whether it is because it is not the most popular and "mainstream" of views. In any event, his works on politics are good from what I've heard.

Inquisitor:

I think he's good on some things, but he seems arrogantly dismissive of Austrianism. One must wonder whether it is because it is not the most popular and "mainstream" of views. In any event, his works on politics are good from what I've heard.

 

I don't think he's a very good macroeconomist.

I think he suffers from the Law of Rothbard though, in that he tends to voice off on things of which he knows the least about.

His micreconomic work is pretty fantastic though.