Sumner Weighs in on Mathiness Debate

     So we get a better idea of the fault-ines. Sumner opposes Paul Romer's criticism of mathiness even though he says that he has little use for math in economics.

   "I don’t think mathematical models are very useful in economics, with a few exception. For me, Friedman and Schwartz’s Monetary History is a model (at least in term of method) of what macroeconomic research should be. So both Romer and Lucas are too mathematical for my taste. I was deeply influenced by Lucas, but it was by his verbal arguments."

   http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=30065&cpage=1#comment-396435

   But isn't this kind of curious? If he has no use for math in econoimcs why does he oppose Romer's criticism of overuse of math in economics?

  Doesn't this suggest that it's not a debate about mathematics first and foremost but instead something else? Something political? When you take the birds eye view of the faceoff what do you see? Romer as leader of the New Keynesians is waging a direct hit on the RBCers. In theory Sumner is closer to NK by his own admission.

 "Romer seems to think that the intellectual dishonesty is mostly confined to a small group of Chicago School economists. [As an aside, although I went to the University of Chicago (as did Romer), I'm not the sort of Chicago School economist that he is referring to. My views on macro are closer to new Keynesian than real business cycle. I believe in sticky wages/prices.]"

  http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/08/shun_the_paper.html

  Yet he ends up criticizing Rome's criticism of mathiness. Why might this be? In his first post at Econolog he says he's worried that he'll be a victim of the kind rules Romer wants in place to guarantee basic standards of economic discourse-to make sure it's a science and not something else-religion?

  "I've always tried to live up to the standards discussed by Romer, but I'm sure that I've fallen short here or there. On the other hand I also know for a fact that there have been times when commenters thought I was being dishonest, or purposely misleading, when that was not the case. [That's the price one pays for being a contrarian.] And because of these false accusations, I know for a fact that if others followed Romer's advice, they would have found at least one "Willie Horton" in my 1000s of blog posts. And Romer says that one is enough."

  "Actually, his strict standard can't do much harm to people like Lucas and Prescott; they have their Nobel Prizes. It's people like me that are much more at risk. I can see it now: "Sumner thinks the Great Recession was caused by tight money, not financial crisis. Only a crackpot or liar could make that claim." I'm the sort of person that would be shunned, not Lucas. Maybe that's why I feel so strongly about this issue."

  http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/08/shun_the_paper.html

  However, by the time he gets to his Money Illusion piece he's much more polarizied against Romer:

  "I did a post over at Econlog, discussing Paul Romer’s recent crusade against academic malfeasance. It turns out that I didn’t do my homework, relying solely on Romer’s numerous blog posts on the subject. Now that I’ve had a chance to read rebuttals by people like David Andolfatto and Stephen Williamson, I’m a bit more skeptical of Romer’s project (and I was already pretty skeptical in the Econlog post.) But it was this remark by Nick Rowe that really set me off:"

  "Paul Romer might like my old post “Macroeconomics when all goods are non-rival“, (even though it’s short run macro and not growth theory like he does). And I was doing (short run) macro with monopolistic competition (pdf) (a couple of months) before it was fashionable. So it’s especially silly (not to mention intolerant of disagreement) for him to make this accusation of me: “After twenty years of playing whac-a-mole with the die-hard price-taking neo-Marshallians, I can tell you exactly where the argument will go next. When the choices are stated as clearly as Dietz does, the neo-Marshallians will claim that there is no such thing as a nonrival good. Nick Rowe has already started laying down a smoke screen of obfuscation on this point.” Nope. He got that one totally wrong, on both counts."

  "And that sort of response doesn’t create a productive environment for new ideas. People need space to muse over old and new ideas, without the authorities making nasty accusations about their motives."

  "If you are going to be rude and obnoxious to an economist with lower academic status, you might at least try to avoid being laughably wrong. For those why don’t know, to call Nick Rowe a “die-hard price-taking Marshallian” is about as silly as calling Milton Friedman a die-hard Keynesian. In this case, Paul Romer literally doesn’t know what he’s talking about."

   "Paul Romer is a brilliant economist, but like a certain other brilliant economist blogger, when he takes a stab at trying to evaluate the motives and quality of his fellow economists, he quickly becomes a very ordinary human being. (Maybe that’s an unfair comparison, I haven’t seen Romer claim that Donald Trump might win the nomination.)"

 http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=30065&cpage=1#comment-396435

 Of course, my ears perked up at his invoking Trump. So I left a light comment-that predictably Sumner answered in a very dogmatic way.

"You mean Trump can’t win? Oops.I don’t know if Krugman really thinks Trump could win-he just said he has no idea either way-but what he really means I’m guessing is he’d love if Trump would win."

 "As would I and Bruce Bartlett."

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/07/moderate-republicans-donald-trump-tea-party-conservative-fringe-2016-120675.html#.Vcer4PlViko

"Barlett thinks this would be good for the GOP"

 Sumner's response:

 "Mike. I tend to assume people mean what they say, but that’s just me."

  See how he answers a joke with such a pious straight line? This is when he gets in his 'So are you saying that Krugman is lying?!' mode. Of course, there is a third category-joking. Krugman it seems to me was just taking the Mickey out of GOPers and Scott-though he claims not to be a GOPer-went for the bait, hook, line, and sinker.

 Such a categorical poise-'Either Krugman is telling the truth or he is lying'-seems strange for a man who considers himself a Rortian.

 "And here Romer insists that there is such a thing as "objective truth":

  "My fundamental premise is that there is an objective notion of truth and that science can help us make progress toward truth."

  "But a few paragraphs earlier sounds positively Rortian:"

  "In our discussions, claims that are recognized by a clear plurality of members of the community by as being better supported by logic and evidence are the ones that are provisionally accepted as being true."Yes, he can use "provisionally" as an out, but when are our beliefs no longer "provisional"? How big must the "plurality" be to make it "objective truth?" And is objective truth never wrong? Remember that we're talking about macroeconomics here, how often do we have metaphysical certitude?"

  http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/08/shun_the_paper.html

  I guess only when we're discussing Krugman. Then Scott at least is very confident that he has metaphysical certitude.

  For the record, I do think Trump winning is unlikely-though like Barlett I would take it. However, if Trump can hang around for the long term-into when the primaries actually start then that's great stuff. The question is simply how long Trump can troll the GOP. My hope is that this is into March and April. I'm talking about hope not what I know for sure. How can anyone have metaphysical certitude here?

     P.S. I'm not optimistic but I hope that Romer responds to Sumner. Everything I know about guys like Romer suggest to me he won't. After all, he probably does just figure Sumner is a 'lower tiered guy'-even lower than Nick Rowe. 

   Yet just because Romer may have gotten Nick wrong doesn't mean his overall point isn't sound. My read though is that this is just the usual pitched battle between NKers and RBCers. In theory you might think that Nick and Scott are closer to NK but politically this is not the case. Especially Scott-I have a little less sense for Nick on this though I suspect that