Economics Questions

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

laminustacitus — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 02:42:36 GMT

Juan:
Was it mentioned that the london school of 'economics' was founded by the fabian society ... ? It's an interesting bit of info...IMO.

May I also mention that Lionell Robbins, and F.A. Hayek both were reknown LSE professors?

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

laminustacitus — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 02:41:37 GMT

ladyattis:
Iam, in terms of the levies in question that did fail, there is question as to the nature of the maintenance and construction of them, which indicates the Corps failed to meet the necessary standards for the given levies to survive the initial surge. In essence, what's known in terms of Katrina is that they cut corners in regards to the levies.

The Army Corps of Engineers is not responsible for the budget of the levies, and the "cut corners" that you speak of, to my knowledge, was a result of the organization not being given enough funds in the first place to do a job that would not require cutting corners. Indeed, the Army Corps of Engineers cannot be blamed for the fact that the budget given to them for the probject was not enough to build a high-quality levee, and, while building the New Orleans levee, they were doing so unfunded.

ladyattis:
No one that was in charge of the levies was ever reprimanded, or even replaced.

The reason for that is that everyone knew that if a storm with the intensity, and storm-surge (Katrine, due to its immense size, had a horrific storm-surge, but I won't go into the physics of it) hit New Orleans as it did, then the levees would fail. The levees built were simply not designed to withstand a Katrina-sized storm, and that was a blatantly known fact.

Of course, budgetary concerns like how much money is alloted for levee-maintenance is far too trival of a matter to effect elections, or at least it was too trival of a matter to affect the elections hitherto.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

Juan — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 02:36:22 GMT

Was it mentioned that the london school of 'economics' was founded by the fabian society ... ? It's an interesting bit of info...IMO.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

ladyattis — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 01:42:08 GMT

Iam, in terms of the levies in question that did fail, there is question as to the nature of the maintenance and construction of them, which indicates the Corps failed to meet the necessary standards for the given levies to survive the initial surge. In essence, what's known in terms of Katrina is that they cut corners in regards to the levies. No one that was in charge of the levies was ever reprimanded, or even replaced.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

laminustacitus — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 21:59:23 GMT

ladyattis:
It may seem to be a neutral bias in terms of the resultant in-housing of all things engineering for the government, but the fact that the dikes in New Orleans and surrounding it were constructed and managed by the Army Corps of Engineers (before, during, and after Katrina), it should be noted little reformation comes to it when it screws up royally.

Keep in mind, though, that everyone knew that if a hurricane the size of Katrina were to hit New Orleans, then the levies would fail "royally". There is no need to reform the Army Corps of Engineers' building of the levies there because it was fully known that they could not withstand what they were hit with. The Army Corps of Engineers bear no blame for the failure of the levies that they built, the responcibility is upon those who believed New Orleans could do with the protection that it had.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

ladyattis — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 17:02:14 GMT

Giles,

I can attest to some institutions being publicly funded does raise some bias in terms of State interventionalism. Case in point, often whenever there is an assessment in terms of improving the flow of a river, the Army Corps of Engineers is *always* picked first in terms of contract and implementation design. There's no third party often taken into account unless the given stretch of river is also heavily used by a single private company, then they often get their own experts. It may seem to be a neutral bias in terms of the resultant in-housing of all things engineering for the government, but the fact that the dikes in New Orleans and surrounding it were constructed and managed by the Army Corps of Engineers (before, during, and after Katrina), it should be noted little reformation comes to it when it screws up royally.

So, I can't say that the State sponsorship of education doesn't have a similar effect in terms of those who hold the public grants or those who sign the paperwork for a graduate student to receive his doctorate as when you're not directly held liable no one really cares to keep an eye on what you're doing. Who's to say key officials aren't funding specific economic scholars over other ones with a different bend in thought (more Austrian that is)? Who's to say they don't give graduate students with a simiple bend a harder time in their pursuit of their degree? It's all speculation at least from my perspective, but it's speculation that has a basis in other State operated/funded institutions as being a driver of mediocrity and favortism (sp?).

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

hayekianxyz — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:53:15 GMT

wilderness:
Obviously you care or you wouldn't keep responding.

Haha, OK then, let me rephrase this. There are ties between every individual in this world and some given state, the question that remains is what significant implications does this have?

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

wilderness — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:49:40 GMT

GilesStratton:

wilderness:

London School of Economics and Political Science.

Of course there's ties between Harvard and government and this London school and government.

There's ties between almost every individual in this world and the state. Which raises the question "who cares?".

Obviously you care or you wouldn't keep responding.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

hayekianxyz — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:16:00 GMT

wilderness:

London School of Economics and Political Science.

Of course there's ties between Harvard and government and this London school and government.

There's ties between almost every individual in this world and the state. Which raises the question "who cares?".

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

liberty student — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 15:49:12 GMT

I see everything ultimately got merged together in a frankenstein hodge podge which is almost unreadable.

If a thread gets derailed, and you can catch it in the first 2 or 4 posts, then a split seems to make sense, or if the participants agree, the discussion can be forked to a completely new thread, but as it is, despite the fracturing of the discussion, the original debate rages where it started.

Sorry your thread got derailed lilburne, but it seems the boundaries of what is crank and what is not, as well as the repulsion of pedantic arguments from pedestrian mindsets are necessary before the meat of your original assertion can be addressed.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

wilderness — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 02:00:46 GMT

London School of Economics and Political Science.

Of course there's ties between Harvard and government and this London school and government.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

hayekianxyz — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 01:12:15 GMT

Lilburne:

GilesStratton:
No, I'm asking him to justify what are essentially empirical claims with empirical evidence.

As I stated in the OP, I don't have a full argument prepared. I just wanted to give an ongoing topic a home for further discussion, and offer a few historical notes apropos to the subject.

Actually, my post was aimed at those who agree with you, as opposed to you specifically. Thank you for the clarification in any case, I await your response.

JonBostwick:

You're confused. A monetary crank is not a value judgement, its a specific ideology. The idea that an unlimited, or nearly unlimited, supply of money should be created in order to provide wealth to everyone.

Monetary cranks are only different from mainstream monetarists by degree.

I'm not aware that I've said that a monetary crank is a value judgement, so I'm not really sure what you're referring to. Besides that, your post lacks any real content. You're merely posted a strawman and then attempted to justify it with a reference to Rothbard. The notion that monetarists believe that an unlimited supply of money would provide wealth to everyone is an odd statement given that monetarists believe that money is largely neutral in the long run. I think you've shown your lack of understanding of any macroeconomics that isn't Austrian.

I also can't angry with Rothbard's angry rant. It's all very well caricaturing the position held by anybody who disagrees with him (read: pretty much every economic ever) but I don't think Rothbard dealt with the objections formulated by the free bankers and monetary disequilibrium theorists. Namely that in the face of an increased demand for money, price rigidites combined with interest rate effects will lead to malinvestment, both intertemporally and intratemporally. This argue is not merely of a different degree to Keynesian theory, but it is of a different kind.

JonBostwick:

How is Mises different from other slightly more statist economics? Knowledge.

You're trying to conflate Mises' failure to formulate is own anarcho-political theory with someone else rejecting of an already formed theory. We have many more resources available to us then even did Rothbard.

Well that's just not true. Mises wrote a review of Man, Economy and State so clearly he read the first statement of "anarcho-capitalism" combined with Austrian economics. So to say that he didn't have access to the information is a falsehood. On the other hand, many mainstream economists have never even heard of Rothbard, let alone anarcho-capitalism, so by your standard they get a free pass to. You've still not given a decent justification for your loose usage of the word "crank". Sorry, try again or bite the bullet and admit Mises is a "crank".

As for rejection anarcho-capitalism and those that you reject it. Are you limiting your use of the word "crank" to those who reject it for political reasons or are those who reject it on scientific grounds also subject to your careless criticisms?

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Economic Science

hayekianxyz — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 00:59:39 GMT

nirgrahamUK:

NirGraham:
?are you challenging lilburne to adopt positivist methodology to demonstrate the correctness of his theory?
are you asking him to engage in historicism?

is this a joke?

Giles:
No, I'm asking him to justify what are essentially empirical claims with empirical evidence.

Nir naively played the positivist game. result:-

laminustacitus:
So if an economic theory does not call for laissez-faire markets, then the only possible conclusion is that it was the result of the state's corruption of academia?

I don't really understand the point of this post. The fact that you were unable to meet the challenge does not make it an unreasonable one. Look, even if you can prove that there is some a priori theory of why it is that intellectuals will be corrupt (which you've not done), you still need to prove it's applicability in any given situation. Which means providing some sort of empirical evidence.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Science?

nirgrahamUK — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 23:40:08 GMT

I joined em back.

not the prettiest but... whatever.

Re: Does State Sponsorship Corrupt Science?

laminustacitus — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 23:21:01 GMT

liberty student:

So after forking my post, now you want to delete or graveyard it. Unbelievable.

And in the process, junk Bostwick's quality response as well.

Then please, move it to the other, more popular thread on the very same topic.