& BRIEFLY NOTED: FOR 2022-02-18 Fr: I must say that the von Hayekian view here has always struck me as completely bonkers, and I don’t think that the very sharp Nicholas Wapshot does a good job here at characterizing it....Friedman thinks that a central bank should use the tools at its disposal... to keep shocks from disrupting the smooth total flow of purchasing power in the economy.... That, Friedman claims, is a “neutral”—a pro-free-market—monetary policy. Von Hayek says… nothing coherent...
What about Milton? His fanfic for The Holy Bible defined our modern vision of heaven and hell. It's harder to say with all the Jane Austen fanfic. It defined a new genre, but no author has ever equaled or surpassed the original. Economics is similar. There is a lot of Adam Smith fanfic, but not much in the way of great Adam Smith fanfic.
Another example to consider for the difficulty in adapting JRRT`s Second Age is the last season of the Game of Thrones. Even with George Martin around to consult the last season was a huge miss.
I couldn't get past the first episode of Wheel of Time. I'm still angry about the time I wasted reading the first several books. "Well, if I keep reading something will happen, right?"
The TV show is vastly better than the books on that account, as far as WoT is concerned. & my theory for why the end of GoT was so bad is that the show runners cut it short by two seasons to try to cash in on their fame—a form of Hobbit Syndrome…
I'll reconsider Amazon WoT then. My impression was HBO didn't want to pay for additional seasons of GoT plus the show runners didn't have the talent to finish the show without a book to rely on.
Yeah, still angry about the Hobbit movies too. At least I can watch the cartoon version
My understanding -- and I'm happy to be corrected on this if I'm wrong -- is that after encountering Keynes, Hayek shifted away from technical economics and focused more on political theory & intellectual history (Constitution of Liberty etc.). I had always assumed he did this because he felt on some level he couldn't compete. Again, happy to be corrected if wrong.
Hayek and Henry Simons became close friends and Hayek shifted to Political Economy, in the style of Henry Simons. I don't think they thought they couldn't compete with Keynes. I'm a fan of Keynes based upon his own views on Political Economy, and Hayek was wrong in his assessment of Keynes views. Much of their personal animosity makes no sense to me. Both Hayek and Keynes had some offensive views, Keynes being the belief that Jews were by nature communists or fascists, incapable of understanding the British views on government, among other Jew Hating opinions. Recently, I read someone trashing Hayek because of his meeting Einstein. Well here, we have Keynes actual views on meeting Einstein:
Upon meeting Einstein, Keynes reflected his impression as follows:
He is a naughty Jew boy covered with ink –that kind of Jew – the kind which has its head above water, the sweet, tender imps who have not sublimated immortality into compound interest. He was the nicest, and the only talented person I saw in all Berlin, except perhaps old
Fuerstenberg, the banker Lydia liked so much, and Kurt Singer, two foot by five, the mystical economist from Hamburg. And he was a Jew; and so was Fuerstenberg and so was Singer. And my dear Melchior is Jew too. Yet if I lived there, I felt I might turn anti-Semite. For the poor Prussian is too slow and heavy on his legs for the other kind of Jews, the ones who are not imps but serving devils, with small horns, pitch forks, and oily tails. It is not agreeable to see civilization so under the ugly thumbs of its impure Jews who have all the money and the power and brains. I vote rather for the plump hausfraus and think fingered Wandering Birds. But I am not sure that I wouldn’t even rather be mixed up with Lloyd George than with the German political Jews.
I can't seem to get people to read Hayek on Hayek, which gives his views just after the war ended. Somewhere, I have read letters between Hayek and Henry Simons. The two men became very close during the 1930s, and remained close until Simons died, a fact which Hayek was devastated by. In one letter I can't find, Simons talked to someone about Hayek and said Hayek had completely changed his mind on deflation in the mid 1930s. Hayek praised Simons books which many considered recomended too much government. I'm not a scholar and cant get at the letters of Henry Simons. Its also a fact that the only policies Michael Oakeshott actually endorsed were those of Henry Simons. People like Coase think Henry Simons was insane. Oddly, Richard Rorty is one of the few people who get Oakeshott and Hayek right philosophically
"Hayek on Hayek: An Autobiographical Dialogue
"MR. MERRIAM: Is the Federal Reserve Bank on the road to serfdom? MR. HAYEK: They make mistakes. MR. MERRIAM: In principle, I mean? MR. HAYEK: No. That the monetary system must be under central control has never, to my mind, been denied by any sensible person. It is part of that framework within which competition can work. MR. MERRIAM: You did not hear the debate on the adoption of the Federal Reserve Bank Board bill. MR. HAYEK: I have studied the history of the Federal Reserve System in very great detail. MR. MERRIAM: You did not hear it denounced, then, as socialistic in character? MR. HAYEK: Do not make me responsible for all the nonsense which has ever been talked about by anybody."
It's a nutter book, but is technically pretty sound. He made one valuable point, too. In their laudable zeal to dethrone gold, Keynes & Co. misread Knapp to insist that money was inherently statal. (Knapp himself pointed to the Hamburg mark banco as a counterexample of working private money.) Hayek showed that things like Libra/Diem *could* exist, unmoored from the state's monopoly of legitimate violence. (Note that Federal Reserve Banks--the operating arm of the Federal Reserve--only have a limited subset of the commercial bank powers of 1913.) Hayek went nutters in assuming that private competitive moneys were good things. But he was right--and Keynes was wrong--in assuming that such crazy things were possible.
It is true that Hayek and Milton Friedman changed views over time, which is why I focus on the positions I agree with. To be fair they are not the only people to change their views over time. Heilbroner comes to mind, for example.
You might also note that Bagehot was bonkers. He was always for free banking. You can look it up . Anyway, focusing on particular policies is more useful.
Fanfic: just now Ada Palmer is talking about Orlando Furioso at Boskone
Fun!
What about Milton? His fanfic for The Holy Bible defined our modern vision of heaven and hell. It's harder to say with all the Jane Austen fanfic. It defined a new genre, but no author has ever equaled or surpassed the original. Economics is similar. There is a lot of Adam Smith fanfic, but not much in the way of great Adam Smith fanfic.
Come for the economics, stay for the SFF.
Another example to consider for the difficulty in adapting JRRT`s Second Age is the last season of the Game of Thrones. Even with George Martin around to consult the last season was a huge miss.
I couldn't get past the first episode of Wheel of Time. I'm still angry about the time I wasted reading the first several books. "Well, if I keep reading something will happen, right?"
The TV show is vastly better than the books on that account, as far as WoT is concerned. & my theory for why the end of GoT was so bad is that the show runners cut it short by two seasons to try to cash in on their fame—a form of Hobbit Syndrome…
I'll reconsider Amazon WoT then. My impression was HBO didn't want to pay for additional seasons of GoT plus the show runners didn't have the talent to finish the show without a book to rely on.
Yeah, still angry about the Hobbit movies too. At least I can watch the cartoon version
My understanding -- and I'm happy to be corrected on this if I'm wrong -- is that after encountering Keynes, Hayek shifted away from technical economics and focused more on political theory & intellectual history (Constitution of Liberty etc.). I had always assumed he did this because he felt on some level he couldn't compete. Again, happy to be corrected if wrong.
Hayek and Henry Simons became close friends and Hayek shifted to Political Economy, in the style of Henry Simons. I don't think they thought they couldn't compete with Keynes. I'm a fan of Keynes based upon his own views on Political Economy, and Hayek was wrong in his assessment of Keynes views. Much of their personal animosity makes no sense to me. Both Hayek and Keynes had some offensive views, Keynes being the belief that Jews were by nature communists or fascists, incapable of understanding the British views on government, among other Jew Hating opinions. Recently, I read someone trashing Hayek because of his meeting Einstein. Well here, we have Keynes actual views on meeting Einstein:
Upon meeting Einstein, Keynes reflected his impression as follows:
He is a naughty Jew boy covered with ink –that kind of Jew – the kind which has its head above water, the sweet, tender imps who have not sublimated immortality into compound interest. He was the nicest, and the only talented person I saw in all Berlin, except perhaps old
Fuerstenberg, the banker Lydia liked so much, and Kurt Singer, two foot by five, the mystical economist from Hamburg. And he was a Jew; and so was Fuerstenberg and so was Singer. And my dear Melchior is Jew too. Yet if I lived there, I felt I might turn anti-Semite. For the poor Prussian is too slow and heavy on his legs for the other kind of Jews, the ones who are not imps but serving devils, with small horns, pitch forks, and oily tails. It is not agreeable to see civilization so under the ugly thumbs of its impure Jews who have all the money and the power and brains. I vote rather for the plump hausfraus and think fingered Wandering Birds. But I am not sure that I wouldn’t even rather be mixed up with Lloyd George than with the German political Jews.
Joan Robinson clearly understood the policies of Mao enough to wholeheartedly endorse them and paise them. Good work Joan.
A strong candidate for the worst book of all time…
I can't seem to get people to read Hayek on Hayek, which gives his views just after the war ended. Somewhere, I have read letters between Hayek and Henry Simons. The two men became very close during the 1930s, and remained close until Simons died, a fact which Hayek was devastated by. In one letter I can't find, Simons talked to someone about Hayek and said Hayek had completely changed his mind on deflation in the mid 1930s. Hayek praised Simons books which many considered recomended too much government. I'm not a scholar and cant get at the letters of Henry Simons. Its also a fact that the only policies Michael Oakeshott actually endorsed were those of Henry Simons. People like Coase think Henry Simons was insane. Oddly, Richard Rorty is one of the few people who get Oakeshott and Hayek right philosophically
"Hayek on Hayek: An Autobiographical Dialogue
"MR. MERRIAM: Is the Federal Reserve Bank on the road to serfdom? MR. HAYEK: They make mistakes. MR. MERRIAM: In principle, I mean? MR. HAYEK: No. That the monetary system must be under central control has never, to my mind, been denied by any sensible person. It is part of that framework within which competition can work. MR. MERRIAM: You did not hear the debate on the adoption of the Federal Reserve Bank Board bill. MR. HAYEK: I have studied the history of the Federal Reserve System in very great detail. MR. MERRIAM: You did not hear it denounced, then, as socialistic in character? MR. HAYEK: Do not make me responsible for all the nonsense which has ever been talked about by anybody."
Then I’m afraid Hayek was not a sensible person https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Denationalization_of_Money
It's a nutter book, but is technically pretty sound. He made one valuable point, too. In their laudable zeal to dethrone gold, Keynes & Co. misread Knapp to insist that money was inherently statal. (Knapp himself pointed to the Hamburg mark banco as a counterexample of working private money.) Hayek showed that things like Libra/Diem *could* exist, unmoored from the state's monopoly of legitimate violence. (Note that Federal Reserve Banks--the operating arm of the Federal Reserve--only have a limited subset of the commercial bank powers of 1913.) Hayek went nutters in assuming that private competitive moneys were good things. But he was right--and Keynes was wrong--in assuming that such crazy things were possible.
It is true that Hayek and Milton Friedman changed views over time, which is why I focus on the positions I agree with. To be fair they are not the only people to change their views over time. Heilbroner comes to mind, for example.
You might also note that Bagehot was bonkers. He was always for free banking. You can look it up . Anyway, focusing on particular policies is more useful.
Yup. very interesting indeed...
Not only call loans upon withdrawals; one must also return deposits when the demand for loans falls.