The Unbroken Window

A market is something which emerges through the actions of everyone but the design of no one. They are part of what Hayek called the extended order of human cooperation.  Recognizing the fact that markets themselves are not consciously created, but that they offer myriad benefits to participants and non-participants alike, raises many questions.
Two such [...]

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Orthodox Keynesians argue that in times when aggregate demand is slack, it makes no difference whether you employ people to dig holes and fill them back up or whether you actually pay people to produce public goods that are valuable. Suppose we accept this proposition – that it doesn’t matter just so long as the [...]

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“… the Mid-Willamette Valley Community Action Agency in Oregon had claimed to create 205 jobs with its $397,761 in stimulus money — spending less than $2,000 per “new” job.”
That was from a very good Greg Mankiw article on economic epistemology (i.e. how do we know that we know anything about economics?). Here’s another one:
“… A [...]

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Does being on the short-end in some transaction empower the loser to become an expert on relevant policy? This is one of my largest pet peeves. For example, no doubt that the families of those murdered and injured in the 9-11 events have suffered a great deal, but does it make any sense at all [...]

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Professor Landsburg calls Krugman out for his dishonest (to put it nicely) presentation of the issue of deficit spending. Here is Krugman:
In America, many self-described deficit hawks are hypocrites, pure and simple. They’re eager to slash benefits for those in need but their concerns about red ink vanish when it comes to tax breaks for [...]

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In Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz’s 997 page principles of economics texts, the word “capitalism” appears exactly zero times.

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Keynesian fiscal policy calls for stimulative government spending programs when private consumption sags and calls for a reduction of government spending when private economic activity is heating up. The joke on the people who are skeptical of government, but who are economic utilitarians nonetheless is that the latter rarely happens. For example, I’d get on [...]

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David Cutler asks this excellent question. His answer:
I identify two factors as being particularly important in organizational stagnation: public insurance programs that are oriented to volume of care and not value, and inadequate information about quality of care. Recent reforms have aspects that bear on these problems.
Not once in the 43 pages of the paper [...]

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Parts of this piece from Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman accurately capture some of the difficulties facing policymakers as they think about bank “re”regulation. Here is an example:
A second version of reform calls for a full recreation of the Quiet Period banking system. We’ll reinstate Glass-Steagall, protect the depository institutions, and let the investment banks sink [...]

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Nobel Laureate Joe Stiglitz has a new piece in the Economists’ Voice. Here are a few examples of his use of scientific economic language:
But despite protests by yesterday’s proponents of deregulation, who would like the government to remain passive, most economists believe that government spending has made a difference, helping to avert another Great Depression.
Of [...]

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