I wrote a piece on Sumner's posts on MMT that got posted on Mike Norman's Economics-which is cool.
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2013/11/sumner-on-achilles-heel-of-mmt.html
http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2013/11/mike-sax-sumner-on-achilles-heel-of-mmt.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&m=1
However, Peter P. left this comment:
"Hmm, who cares what Sumner thinks about MMT? He is hopelessly lost."
See, for me that's part of the problem. Sumner doesn't write about MMT or try to engage either as in his mind he thinks 'who cares what MMTers think the're totally lost.'
We have two schools of thought talking past each other, each happy just to preach to the choir, neither interested in trying to engage. I guess the reason I do think you have to care a little what Sumner says-even if your opinion of him is as low as say Greg's (LOL)-is because a lot of people do care what he thinks and not just Right wing ideologues either. Many more centrist or even liberal types have been seduced by his intuitive ideas-intuition of course is not proof of truth as we've known since Kant.
There are also people like myself who have suffered from unemployment who have latched onto Sumner's assurances that just do his NGDPLT and all will be well-like Becky Hargrove who is a very nice person but who I think has been a little beguiled, frankly.
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2013/02/this-is-your-brain-on-scott-sumner.html
Hickey's piece confirmed that I'm right in thinking that they favor a permanent zero interest rate set by the Fed and basically absorbing the Fed back into the Treasury. I'm not sure what this would really mean and probably wouldn't go that far myself.
In a perfect world for me, we shouldn't necessarily 'end the Fed' but we should certainly trim it's 'independence.' The number of regional Feds should be cut down, the number of President's should be and they should all be nominated through Congress. The Fed should not have a presumption of somehow being free of politics-a number of countries, like Britain and Canada have an arraignment where the Treasury tells the Fed what monetary policy is desirable-which is how it was in the U.S. during the Eccles era.
At the end of the day,even is Sumner doesn't get it a lot of people think that he does and that at least should be a point of concern. I'd love to have a Sumner-Mosler debate but doubt that Sumner would do it-he probably isn't going to be seen in public with anyone outside the Neoclassical bubble.
Thanks to Y for letting me know that Bob Murphy already debated Mosler-I've just started watching it and am in econ nerd Heaven!
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2013/11/sumner-on-achilles-heel-of-mmt.html
http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2013/11/mike-sax-sumner-on-achilles-heel-of-mmt.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&m=1
However, Peter P. left this comment:
"Hmm, who cares what Sumner thinks about MMT? He is hopelessly lost."
See, for me that's part of the problem. Sumner doesn't write about MMT or try to engage either as in his mind he thinks 'who cares what MMTers think the're totally lost.'
We have two schools of thought talking past each other, each happy just to preach to the choir, neither interested in trying to engage. I guess the reason I do think you have to care a little what Sumner says-even if your opinion of him is as low as say Greg's (LOL)-is because a lot of people do care what he thinks and not just Right wing ideologues either. Many more centrist or even liberal types have been seduced by his intuitive ideas-intuition of course is not proof of truth as we've known since Kant.
There are also people like myself who have suffered from unemployment who have latched onto Sumner's assurances that just do his NGDPLT and all will be well-like Becky Hargrove who is a very nice person but who I think has been a little beguiled, frankly.
http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2013/02/this-is-your-brain-on-scott-sumner.html
Hickey's piece confirmed that I'm right in thinking that they favor a permanent zero interest rate set by the Fed and basically absorbing the Fed back into the Treasury. I'm not sure what this would really mean and probably wouldn't go that far myself.
In a perfect world for me, we shouldn't necessarily 'end the Fed' but we should certainly trim it's 'independence.' The number of regional Feds should be cut down, the number of President's should be and they should all be nominated through Congress. The Fed should not have a presumption of somehow being free of politics-a number of countries, like Britain and Canada have an arraignment where the Treasury tells the Fed what monetary policy is desirable-which is how it was in the U.S. during the Eccles era.
At the end of the day,even is Sumner doesn't get it a lot of people think that he does and that at least should be a point of concern. I'd love to have a Sumner-Mosler debate but doubt that Sumner would do it-he probably isn't going to be seen in public with anyone outside the Neoclassical bubble.
Thanks to Y for letting me know that Bob Murphy already debated Mosler-I've just started watching it and am in econ nerd Heaven!
I should say that I DO care what Scott says. I care that what he says gets discussed debated and questioned vehemently. I just dont care to do that WITH HIM however.
ReplyDeleteHe hasnt shown himself to be anything close to intellectually honest. I want many to discuss what he says because many people listen to him, but I have no illusions that Scott is ever capable of seeing things any other way than he does, so its really quite useless to engage him. Its more affective, I think, to simply work to debunk his ideas in other forums. Kind of like having a site called "Stupid things Scott Sumner Says" and simply quote him and then make logical arguments against him. He probably would never come to that site to defend himself but he might address things at his blog (while Im sure he would claim being taken out of context, or being misunderstood) unless it was by someone not allowed to discuss economics.
BTW, very cool that you got linked to at MNE!
ReplyDeleteAnd to continue with my point about a site called STSSS, did you see the post at MR where Sankowski pretty much diced Sumner up and showed him to be clueless about how a NGDP futures market might work. Scott would likely say Sankowski shouldnt be doing posts about new ideas for monetary policy since he's not an economist.
I think that my blog is a kind of STSSS site-I'd say that's exactly my point. You're right about trying to engage him-he always has the out of 'well you're not an economist anyway so I simply don't need to respond to anything you say.'
ReplyDeleteI always say it: Annoy Scott Sumner-read Diary of a Republican Hater
"I think that my blog is a kind of STSSS site-I'd say that's exactly my point"
DeleteI should have put a (wink wink) in my comment cuz I was sort of referring to you.
Look its occurred to me that maybe my comment have given you a bad name with Scott. I'm sort of your Major Freedom or Morgan Warstler. You generally try and be nice and polite to him...... I dont. Scott probably thinks you should ban me because I lower the level of discussion. Tell him you will if he bans Morgan!!
LOL. In fairness. Greg it surely isn't your fault. Though I've usually been polite it does no good as he knows I'm a skeptic and he has no interest in engaging.
DeleteYou are many things but you're nothing like MF. Not many actual human beings are!
It is cool getting on Mike Norman and not for the first time either-I also found being linked on Delong very gratifying-a few times and even Lars Christensen did once.
ReplyDeleteAlso JKH and once by Steven Waldman but hey, who's keeping track? LOL
You should keep track..... thats called accounting! Add those to your asset side! Now.... about that liabilities side.....
Delete