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Strategies & Market Trends : Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Elroy Jetson who wrote (76804)	3/24/2008 10:24:35 PM
From: Oblomov	Respond to of 116555

I like Friedman; he was a great popularizer of liberal ideas. But I agree (contra Friedman) with parts of Schumpeter, Hayek, Rothbard, and Higgs on the origins of the Great Depression, as well as on what its remedy should have been. I also think (contra Rothbard and Higgs) that the Depression was not simply the handiwork of policymakers, although they played their part. financialsense.com auburn.edu mises.org independent.org In my view, the monetarist approach is one-dimensional in that it commits the same error as Keynesianism: it presumes that a policymaker can know what the right levels are of economic output, employment, and money supply. Worse than Keynes, Friedman presumes that the three are linked deterministically even if loosely. At least Keynes admitted the presence of "animal spirits" that account for such so-called anomalies as the savings-investment disparity. On your second point, I disagree heartily with champagne socialism. I think one might make a case for limited redistribution of income for poor relief on a temporary basis. But not rich relief or upper middle class relief. And whatever redistribution takes place should be done plainly and openly through an extremely simple tax code, not buried in arcana. Friedman wasn't a conservative, although he was on the right. Do I agree with everyone on the right? No. Do I disagree with all ideas that emit from the left? No, again. What people categorize as "left" and "right" have changed a few times over the past century, anyway. We might as well be debating about Stalwarts and Mugwumps as left and right...