I tried to persuade David Laidler to join us in the econoblogosphere, especially given recent arguments about Milton Friedman. I have not yet succeeded, but David did say I could use these two paragraphs from his email:  "However – re. the "what Milton would have said" debate  – When I was just getting started in […]

There must be some macroeconomic equilibrating force out there we don't know about. A dark force. It's sometimes slow to work, but it does work eventually. And whatever it is, it must make monetarism truer than it theoretically would otherwise be. A monetarist force. And whatever it is, it must be much stronger than a […]

"At the macroeconomic level, is the market economy self-equilibrating?" I used to think that was the most important and fundamental question in macroeconomics. Now I think it's a stupid question that doesn't make sense. So when I read Paul Krugman saying: "Think of it this way: Friedman was an avid free-market advocate, who insisted that […]

Some Austrians (I can't remember which ones) define "inflation" as "a growing supply of base money". [Update: Jonathan Finegold gently corrects me.] This used to strike me, as it strikes most economists, as a bit daft. OK, I would think, you can define "inflation" that way if you want, but  "rising prices" is what the […]