So I’m reading an interesting article written in 1975 titled “Securites as a Hedge against Inflation: 1910-1969″ by a business professor at the University fo Iowa named Robert M. Soldofsky. I can’t link to the article because it’s behind a paywall. More to come on this article in a later post.
Anyway, the good professor mentioned an article authored by Paul Samuelson and Robert Solow in 1960 titled “Analytical Aspects of Anti-Inflation Policy.” The conclusion of Samuelson and Solow was:
“The estimated Phillip’s curve for the United States indicates average unemployment in excess of 9 percent is to be expected during periods of less than 1.5 percent average inflation.”
Did you read that? When inflation is less than 1.5% then unemployment will be over 9%! These people won the Nobel Prize in Economics for crap like this and in fact are highly respected in economics. Samuelson’s textbooks are still studied in undergrad economics departments. Sorry, I have no respect for this man.
To wit:
In the 13th edition of Economics, he (Paul Samuelson) offered up this assertion: “[T]he Soviet economy is proof that, contrary to what many skeptics had earlier believed, a socialist command economy can function and thrive.” The same year that version of Economics was published, the Berlin Wall fell. Two years later, the Soviet Union itself became defunct.
And:
As the journalist Arnold Beichman has observed, (Samuelson) argued in the tenth edition of Economics that “[i]t is a vulgar mistake to think that most people in Eastern Europe are miserable.”
Samuelson, and his ilk, can pound sand as far as I’m concerned. How many people suffered because of clowns like this with their fancy-pants math telling countries how to govern themselves? They looked at their math calculations as superior to the decisions human beings make every minute of every day, just see the unemployment targets I mentioned above. Thus, according to their math, if you’re advising a country you’d want inflation much higher than 1.5% or you’ll have nearly double digit unemployment. The damage they’ve caused can not be overlooked and shouldn’t ever be forgiven. Let God forgive these fools. I won’t.
Oh, it’s not just Samuelson. There is plenty of evidence to indict even Milton Friedman too. Don’t get me wrong. These are charlatans of the first order. The whole lot of ‘em. The economics profession sold their souls when they had physics envy in the latter part of the 1950’s. Economists wanted to be taken seriously, like a hard science, so they created all kinds of idiotic math formulas, just like the physicists, who themselves no longer experimented in the field but rather engaged in mathematical theatrics to “prove” their validity.
If an economist, or anyone who needs math to prove their theories, tells you it’s warm and sunny outside, get your jacket and umbrella and run for the hills!