Anderson left Harvard before getting his PhD because he came to view the field much as Boykin does—as an intellectual pursuit of diminishing returns. But that’s not the case on the internet. “Implicit in ‘the internet’ is the scope, the coverage of it,” Anderson says. “It makes opportunities are much greater, but it also enriches the challenge space, the problem space. There is intellectual upside.” Was thinking of p…
Interesting.. would you suggest some to follow? And what is the current consensus/debate? We are 20 years out of NAFTA and free trade with China. I see a lot of journeymen/trades that do well in union gigs, police/fire/teachers and blue collar professionals... Those who aren't doing well are people outside of this (service/retail) and illegal immigrants. I guess manufacturing was a union gig that one could get into..…
He starts out strong and gives a good overview of the "schools" that have been laid to rest, but concludes on some kind of utopian, happy note that I don't believe he has any evidence to support. But then again he spends most of his time in conversation with leading economists (I think) so he should have a pretty good idea of what's up.
Paul Romer has a good summary of the state of macro in his 9/16 paper "The Trouble With Macroeconomics". Here's the abstract:
For more than three decades, macroeconomics has gone backwards. The treatment of identification now is no more credible than in the early 1970s but escapes challenge because it is so much more opaque. Macroeconomic theorists dismiss mere facts by feigning an obtuse ignorance about such simple assertions as "tight monetary policy can cause a recession." Their models attribute fluctuations in aggregate variables to imaginary causal forces that are not influenced by the action that any person takes. A parallel with string theory from physics hints at a general failure mode of science that is triggered when respect for highly regarded leaders evolves into a deference to authority that displaces objective fact from its position as the ultimate determinant of scientific truth.
It's a good one...https://paulromer.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/WP-Trouble....
Personally, just from reading books and papers it seems like there are very few economic clans left, just economic celebrities (Krugman, Varoufakis, etc.) and the profession's credibility is suffering due to the Fed (and other leading central banks) inability to make anything happen with an empty clip monetary policy wise.