Hedonism Bot’s LawyerNov 24, 2022
Blair Fix

Cory Doctorow (@pluralistic) on economics training and the new open access Core textbook:

"How is it possible that a coterie of self-appointed court sorcerers to the world’s governments manage to keep their jobs despite being regularly, predictably, and catastrophically wrong?"

Answer: indoctrination

https://capitalaspower.com/2022/11/at-last-a-new-econ-101-textbook/

At last, a new Econ 101 textbook – Capital As Power

Originally published at pluralistic.net Cory Doctorow Neoclassical economics is a hell of a drug. It has no theory of prices, no account of inflation, and its models all presume the existence of a perfectly rational “homo economicus” who is a “utility maximizer” with perfect information. Even the Queen is wise to the scam, grilling Bank […]

Capital As Power
Nov 24, 2022 at 8:59pmWeb
Show threada1Nov 24, 2022
@blair_fix @pluralistic “Anyone who suggests that this is not a great way to run a society is shouted down by a chorus of politicians who insist that doing good things for people is a fool’s errand, because it contradicts the “science” of economics.” As an economist and MBA, I couldn’t agree more.
Show threada1Nov 27, 2022
@blair_fix as a matter of fact, it goes much further. There is quite a number of defeatists even amongst the right-minded group of people. However, when it comes to a war, it's usually the enemy intelligence telling you the war is lost, and that there's no sense in continuing the fight. So I have learnt to watch out with care for those that claim "all is lost anyway" befoe it actually is.
Show threada1Nov 27, 2022
@blair_fix in a war of classes, or, better to say rich vs poor people, we know of the power of the Gini coefficient. We should never ignore the relation between the richest 10 folks holding on to more wealth than 40% of the poorest, and convincing them that somehow giving tax breaks to the richest equals freedom for them.
Show threadBlair FixNov 27, 2022

@ar1

Agreed.

Show threadBrad WeedNov 25, 2022

@blair_fix @pluralistic

“Overall, the message of these texts is ‘the economy is about interactions in competitive markets (a positive statement) that function pretty well (a normative one) and in which governments ought not to meddle.’”

The irony is Adam Smith was very clear that government indeed should meddle. And as a moral philosopher, he’d be astonished his name is attached to such widespread income inequality.

Show threadBrad WeedNov 25, 2022
@blair_fix @pluralistic
I dug into the life and beliefs of Adam Smith a bit in my most recent essay…
https://interplace.io/p/is-the-invisible-hand-pushing-a-smith
Is the 'Invisible Hand' Pushing a Smith Myth?

Listen now (22 min) | A supreme evil capitalist or a moral sentimentalist?

Interplace
Show threadKim ScheinbergNov 25, 2022

@bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic

I wish fewer people would quote Wealth of Nations and more people would read The Theory of Moral Sentiments.

"We're supposed to worship Adam Smith but you're not supposed to read him. That's too dangerous. He's a dangerous radical."
-- Noam Chomsky

Show threadDavid MouritsenNov 25, 2022
@kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic I wish more people read The Wealth of Nations, in addition to The Theory of Moral Sentiments. The thunderous conclusion to Book I, for example, makes it amply clear how badly his name is misused. Smith would be appalled.
Show thread🦋 Ben West 🐒🌻Nov 25, 2022

@davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic

Curious if y'all have come across the Ecological Economics textbook produced by Herman Daly (former world bank senior economist).
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77985.Ecological_Economics

I read it along with my conventional text book a couple decades ago as a student. I found it profoundly insightful at the time. Focus is on steady state economics and better indicators than GDP (not just valuation of natural resources/services like environmental economics).

Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications

Conventional economics is increasingly criticized for f…

Goodreads
Show threadDavid MouritsenNov 25, 2022
@BenWest @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic Indeed! I wonder if there has been a new edition...
Show threadBrad WeedNov 25, 2022

@BenWest Thanks, Ben. I have not seen that one but will check it out.

I am aware of ecological economics, but have thus far just traveled down the path of circular economics. My next post on Interplace is dipping my toe into a couple naturalists of the Enlightenment who offered a counter narrative to the more popular mechanistic determinism rooted in ecology.

I'm a big fan of complexity economics which draws a lot on ecological metaphors.

Show threadBlair FixNov 25, 2022

@BenWest @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @pluralistic

Yes! That book was major influence. Reading it made me want to study political economy.

Show threadDylanNov 26, 2022
@davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic you mean Adam “rents are bad and so are excess profits at the expense of workers” Smith? 100% agree. And anyone citing his name who can’t cite anything other than the invisible hand bit should be publicly mocked and chided.
Show thread💉💉💉Kumara📎Republic↙️↙️↙️🔻Nov 26, 2022

@dylanmorgan @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic With apologies to the 40th US President:

A late-stage capitalist reads Adam Smith. A non-late-stage capitalist understands Adam Smith.

Show threadCarolannieNov 26, 2022
@dylanmorgan @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic
Adam Smith famously declared that 'People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the publick, or in some contrivance to raise prices'.
Show threadChristie DudleyNov 26, 2022

@carolannie
Isn't that more or less the gist behind US antitrust law?

@dylanmorgan @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic

Show threadDavid MouritsenNov 26, 2022
@longobord @carolannie @dylanmorgan @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic The word "monopoly" appears 175 times in The Wealth of Nations -- though Smith uses it essentially as a synonym for restrictions on free trade. However, Smith's concerns were over the suppression of competition and the limitation of choice and quantity of commodities, not just price-fixing -- contrary to the views of Bork, Posner, and the Chicago School, and the shadow they cast over American jurisprudence.
Show threadDylanNov 26, 2022
@longobord @carolannie @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic maybe the law as written, but in the 1970s several far-right judges argued that higher prices for consumers should be the only concern addressed when considering antitrust prosecution, and the US DoJ decided to accept that.
Show threadDavid MouritsenNov 26, 2022

@carolannie @dylanmorgan @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic The final words of the next chapter: “The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order ought always to be listened to with great precaution...

It comes from an order of men whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it.”

Show threadjoedobnerNov 26, 2022
@carolannie @dylanmorgan and Leonard Nimoy and Sid Meyer burned that quote into so many Millennial brains.
Show threadjohnaldisNov 26, 2022
@joedobner @carolannie @dylanmorgan What’s the context here? Is it one thing (Nimoy doing voices for one of the Civilisations?)?
Show threadGreenDotGuyNov 26, 2022
@dylanmorgan @davidmouritsen @kims @bradweed @blair_fix @pluralistic this is why I think we need to figure out a way to reconnect 'high rents' with 'more supply', right now, there's two hands, one forking all the money to the other.
Show threadBrad WeedNov 25, 2022

@kims
Even Wealth of Nations exposes his belief in government restraint as a necessary condition to a strong economy. I suspect if Wealth of Nations were required reading, it alone would be considered 'too dangerous'!

Let alone TMS!

I did my best to make sense of the progression of his thinking in this recent post...https://interplace.io/p/is-the-invisible-hand-pushing-a-smith

Love that Chomsky quote, btw. Thanks. 🙏🏼

Is the 'Invisible Hand' Pushing a Smith Myth?

Listen now (22 min) | A supreme evil capitalist or a moral sentimentalist?

Interplace