Nobel Prize

Économiste Monétaire

The 2010 winner(s) will be announced on Monday. There's a pretty good list here on potential winners. T-R have picked four from that list that they believe are most likely to win:

• Alberto Alesina
  Nathaniel Ropes Professor of Political Economics, Department of Economics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA USA
  Why: for theoretical and empirical studies on the relationship between politics and macroeconomics, and specifically for research on politico-economic cycle
• Nobuhiro Kiyotaki
  Professor of Economics, Department of Economics, Princeton University, Princeton NJ USA
  Why: for formulation of the Kiyotaki-Moore model, which describes how small shocks to an economy may lead to a cycle of lower output resulting from a decline in collateral values that creates a restrictive credit environment
• John H. Moore
  George Watson’s and Daniel Stewart’s Professor of Political Economics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, and Professor of Economics, Department of Economics, London School of Economics, London, England
  Why: for formulation of the Kiyotaki-Moore model, which describes how small shocks to an economy may lead to a cycle of lower output resulting from a decline in collateral values that creates a restrictive credit environment
• Kevin M. Murphy
  George J. Stigler Distinguished Service Professor of Economics, University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Chicago, IL USA, and Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford CA USA
  Why: for pioneering empirical research in social economics, including wage inequality and labor demand, unemployment, addiction, and the economic return of investment in medical research, among other topics

I'd like to see Sims get it this year.

Time Magazine

Sims/Sargent/Hansen more likely than any of the above. Kevin Murphy is only about 17.

Still holding out for Avinash Dixit, again.

Time Magazine

The Committee found a winner!

Économiste Monétaire

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/2010/

Pissarides?

Time Magazine

The process wasn't frictionless.

Économiste Monétaire

I laughed at that, I'm such a nerd .

Time Magazine

Meanwhile, proponents of the Efficient Market Hypothesis have expressed their surprise that the Prize was not awarded to Oliver Williamson and Elinor Ostrom again.

Slippers 2

Disappointment from Bill Mitchell at U of Newcastle in Australia:

Conclusion

To repeat my reply to a question the other day about my views on this award I said:

Their work has made it harder for governments to maintain full employment and their analysis – which is full of holes and misrepresentations has been used to justify supply-side policies which deny mass unemployment and which focus on the victims of the job shortage rather than the true cause.

They are worthy choices for a Nobel Prize – so bad is their work.

Krugman claims that the award is “A happy day for economic theory”. Given he has been claiming that the current problem is largely due to a failure of aggregate demand I wonder why he is so willing to laud a body of theory that has downplayed (excluded) the role of demand in causing mass unemployment. Why give credit to economists who deny the basic causes of unemployment and, instead, propose policies which have attacked the victims of the systemic failure to produce enough jobs – the unemployed themselves?

My view is that this award is a celebration of what is among the most obscene aspects of mainstream economic theory.

That is enough for today!

Time Magazine

Slippers 2 wrote: »

Bullshit from Bill Mitchell at U of Newcastle in Australia:

FYP.

Slippers 2

Time Magazine wrote: »

FYP.

The following graph shows the UV curve for Australia (using annual data since 1967). I have dated some of the observations to show the dates where the outward shifts occurred. Relate those dates with the preceding graph (the evolution of the unemployment rate) and you will quickly conclude that the major shifts all occurred during a major cyclical downturn – that is, when aggregate demand collapsed and unemployment rose sharply.

At these times, there was no major shift in any policies which the neo-liberals (and these Nobel prize winners) have identified as “structural impediments” to search-effectiveness. The Australian experience is replicated in every nation I have examined closely. The notion that the shifts in the UV curve are due to some policy-induced structural deterioration in search effectiveness beggars belief. To advance the view that the workers suddenly choose this sharp rise in unemployment and to try to influence policy to cut benefits during this period is in my evaluation a crime against humanity.

.

Time Magazine

This guy is completely missing the point.