Month: May 2007

Arnold Kling posed the question.  Let’s go further and say these people reprogram themselves to behave like true immortals, rather than sticking with their inherited and earlier evolved biological intuitions. 

If we assume monotonicity (and why shouldn’t we?), we can draw inferences from societies with short life expectancies.  They are extremely superstitious, willing to entertain tyranny, and hardly libertarian.  Try teaching Henry Hazlitt in the Congo.  More generally, pending death makes us think of honor, patriotism, and in-group solidarity. 

If longer lives move us away from such feelings, yes some immortals would be quite libertarian.  That is one direction a tolerant and secular morality can take, but that is hardly the end of the story.  Many more immortals would become non-theistic, rational constructivist, cosmopolitan Benthamite modern liberals, much like Matt Yglesias or Brad DeLong.  I believe the elasticity of ideological adjustment is greater in this direction.  Those views, and the libertarians, would grow in popularity at the expense of the middle, but I doubt if the libertarians would become a majority or even a plurality.

In other words, a society of immortals would become more like…uh…the blogosphere.

Most of all, I would expect more libertarian attitudes toward social issues.  Immortals are going to want to try everything, and why not? 

Another factor is the declining scarcity of time.  I recall, as a kid, seeing a made-for-TV movie about immortals.  None of them had plans or homes.  They all lived under a bridge, with the bums, and behaved wantonly.  They wanted to behave without social constraint, and that meant shedding their reputations and in essence going on the lam.  They figured there was always more time to shape up, slip back into a reputation, and run a major corporation.  But how did they vote?

Nicolai Foss writes:

I have the feeling that the thought of Friedrich von Hayek is receiving less and less attention…among economists and other social scientists Hayek is increasingly attaining the status of a classical writer in the sense of Schumpeter – namely somebody who is cited and invoked, but mainly for ceremonial/ritualistic reasons and more often in footnotes than in the main text. In contrast, little use is made of his work for purposes of actual theory development.

The "Hayek Industry" continues, but it feels less focal to the profession.  It is also less fashionable for outsiders to respond to Hayek, as did Lucas and Stiglitz.  I attribute this to two factors.  First the shift toward empirical work makes Hayek less relevant to many mainstream debates.  Hayek’s work had implications for the work of Kenneth Arrow, but not for how abortion legalization affects the crime rate.  Furthermore central planning and business cycles — two of Hayek’s main areas — are no longer such hot topics.  Second is the blogosphere.  Many of Hayek’s insights are deep and relatively philosophical; it is hard to put them into a snappy blog post.  For better or worse, it is easier for a market-oriented blogger to follow Becker, Alchian, or even Mises than Hayek.  I also believe that the blogosphere will, in the long run, favor the thought of Tullock over Buchanan, for similar reasons.

By the way, here is Nicolai on economists’ autographs.

The flight from Oslo airport to Bergen airport costs less than the cab ride from Oslo airport to downtown Oslo.  Blame the taxi cartel if you wish (is there one in Norway?), but relative to food and other prices that cab ride seemed like a bargain.  Fifty minutes in the cab cost only three or so kung pao chickens with water.  Imagine how location theory should look when it is cheapest to travel far and costliest to make small moves.  I am reminded of Venice, where getting your shopping cart up through the steps to cross a canal or two is sometimes harder than taking a train or boat out of the place altogether.

This controversial article from The Nation says yes, heterodox and non-neoclassical approaches are unduly ignored.  I’m likely writing more about this elsewhere (you’ll get the link), so I’ll save my thoughts for now.

1. Alan Greenspan certainly has been heard from a lot since his "retirement". Apparently current club members don’t like it as Bank of England Governor Mervyn King put a brutal slam on Greenie last week (as the article details though, Alan is laughing all the way to the bank). I approve of anything that makes central banking more like professional wrestling.

2. Guillermo Ortiz (or the Alan Greenspan of Mexico) is closing in on 9 years as Head of Mexico’s central bank. He inherited an inflation rate of 19%, which was steadily reduced.  It is around 4% today and much less volatile than in the past. Good job, Guillermo!

3. Central Banking, Japanese style.  With the country beset and bedeviled by deflation and stagnant growth, the BOJ stuck with a virtually zero interest rate for almost 6 years before getting frisky and raising rates to .25% last July. By all accounts it was so much fun they wanted to do it again the next month but were heavily pressured by the Government to hold off. This winter they raised rates again to .5%. Now, prices and wages have started falling again in Japan, but the BOJ boys can at least hold their heads up high at the next club meeting.

4. In the US the FOMC now has an unprecedented level of academic economic expertise. Start with Chairman Bernanke, who is ranked 107 in this list of top 1000 economists by publications from 1990-2000, then add longtime MR friend Randall Kroszner (ranked 363) and Fredrick Mishkin (ranked 93). In addition, St. Louis Fed President William Poole is a voting member this year. Poole is among the top ranked economists by publications from 1969 – 2000, as is alternate member Charles Plosser, ex-editor of the Journal of Monetary Economics and President of the Philadelphia Fed (Plosser is also ranked very high on citations from 1975 – 2000). Whether this is a good or bad thing remains to be seen!

5. Finally, for those hoping that new president Sarkozy will lead real reform in France, it turns out that he has met the enemy and it is the ECB!! This doesn’t seem good to me, though after taking a lot of hits Sarkozy has apparently backed down at bit.