7 Comments

The whole "government should not be picking winners and losers" bumper sticker is the silliest smart sounding argument I can think of. That's the only thing a government actually ever does. From tribal clans to Magna Carta to James Madison, the whole point of the social contract is to find an acceptable way of picking winners and losers. Anarchy is the only form of government that doesn't pick a winner or loser.

Expand full comment

FWIW, a link to the 'bullshit jobs' article at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/09500170211015067

Expand full comment

And ... linked by Doctorow via Naked Capitalism: https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/12/streaming-doesnt-pay/#linkdump

Hit a nerve there

Expand full comment

Schumpeter: I think the chip and other supply chain problems were mainly that the Fed had not by early 2020 firmly established in people minds that it would not allow another demand deficiency/low inflation episode as it has after the 2008 financial crisis.

Industrial policy: We may have dodged a bullet with the NRA as we did not the air-gun pellet of the AAA.

Of course the major accomplishment of the New Deal was, in effect, going off gold and a major failing was the Fed's failing to keep NGDP rising in spite of the tax increase of 1938 (?), although at least it was progressive. [Ain't hindsight great!]

Expand full comment