What's gone wrong with economics?
There is a lot of discussion going on about the state of economics today. A lot of criticism is coming from outside the academic establishment – from students, journalists, public intellectuals and policy makers. This has occurred since the financial crash of 2008 and subsequent recession, although it can also be seen as really an intensification of much older debates about economic thought that have been going on for many years before that. There has been intense debate, within the economics 'profession', about the way the subject was done, going back at least to the sixties if not earlier. However it had ceased to take place within the mainstream and nowadays most critical writing is confined to a few fringe academic journals, while the main journals have become almost exclusively the domain of a narrow range of orthodox thinking. This lack of open debate was very unhealthy.
One of the most remarkable instances of criticism emanating from government circles occurred in 2008 when the queen was visiting LSE just after the crash and she asked the assembled dignitaries why nobody had seen it coming.
But anyway many economists are engaged in forecasting and their inability to spot the crash was a major failure of their methodology. The fact that the crash happened was also a consequence of seriously flawed thinking underpinning the policy regime in force.
So what is the problem? Are the students and critics right? Or is it just that they lack the skills necessary to do mainstream economics?
A very common criticism of economics teaching and scholarship generally is that it has become far too mathematical. Students today have to take and pass prerequisite courses in quantitative methods before they can study economic principles. Both mathematical and statistical techniques are required. Also scholarship is heavily mathematical with economics writing in academic journals and textbooks couched in algebraic symbolism which makes it extremely difficult to read for all but a few initiates who already have expertise in the area. The usual response is to say that complainers should just get on with it: that is the way economics is.
It is true that academic writing about economics should be written in clear language and not pretend to be something – mathematics - that it is not. This is a major and valid criticism of the way economics is done.
His work was mathematically very rigorous but written so as to be comprehensible to the reader. That does not suggest that mathematics has to be a prerequisite to studying economics at undergraduate lev el though it might be needed before conducting research.
There is an issue about what sort of quantitative techniques students should be expected to know. Statistics is essential because economics is all about measurement. But in their first year students only need to be taught basic economic statistics – that is the measurement of the economy. Students should know about how an index number is constructed so they can understand things like the consumer price index, or the rate of growth of GDP, and graphical representation of trends. Only high school maths is required for this. This is quantitative methods for describing the economy at a very basic level, the foundations for a proper understanding.
More advanced topics such as optimization theory, statistical inference and parameter estimation have to do with economic modelling and not required for an economics degree. Some of the techniques students are taught are really of questionable use. It really does not aid understanding or develop useful skills to have to derive demand functions from first principles expressed exclusively in algebraic terms, with a given utility function – very few are likely to ever need to do that in their later career, only those who go on to very advanced theoretical research. Studying the idea of a demand function and the nature and meaning of a utility function are far more important.
So I do not agree with the simple proposition that the subject is just too mathematical. Quantification is intrinsic to economics. But I think that often what is taught is the wrong sort of quantitative methods – more to do with abstract economic modelling than with the measurement of the real world economy. And too much economics scholarship is expressed using needless mathematical notation, a form of jargon. Economists should heed the advice of Marshall and write in clear English.
What has gone wrong with economics is not only that there is too much writing couched in needlessly mathematical terms but something more fundamental than that. It is that there has occurred a major shift of focus away from macro to micro. There has also been a shift away from real-world empirical relevance to mainly theoretical argument. Macroeconomics – by which I mean primarily the economics of Keynes – is no longer taught in many universities. By that I mean it is not taught properly. The economics of Keynes has been sidelined.
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In his latest blog, Mediamacro myth 4: The immediate necessity of belt tightening ,Simon Wren-Lewis demonstrates the folly of governments trying to cut the deficit in a recession when interest rates are as low as they currently are.
We must always remember that a country is an economy not a company or a single household. Attempting to cut the government deficit in a recession only succeeds in making things worse.
A lletter published in the FinancialTimes recently spells out the likely consequences of the EU's austerity policies.
Fourteen years later Hitler and the Nazis came to power in Germany which led to the Second World War.
Let me be absolutely clear that I am not saying that macroeconomics has nothing to learn from the financial crisis. What I am suggesting is that when those lessons have been learnt, the basics of the macroeconomics we teach will still be there. .....However, this must surely use the intertemporal optimising framework that is the heart of modern macro.
The problem is in the last sentence. The use of a microeconomic optimising framework that he insists on severely limits the scientific value of the model. We cannot do meaningful macroeconomics, which is all about income, employment and the price level, using microeconomic tools.
First, it is surely unreasonable to model the behaviour of a single representative household as standing for a whole society of millions of individuals. That shifts the analysis away from the aggregate behaviour of the whole economy that we are interested in understanding. Instead of focussing on the problem of effective demand, which is all about the circular flow of spending among income-constrained households and firms, it nets out all that is important.
But, perhaps more importantly, it fails the fundamental test of a scientific model: that it must faithfully reflect the real world it is describing. There are strong grounds for believing that people, or a substantial number of them, are not doing the kind of continuous intertemporal optimisation at the centre of the model.
Compelling evidence for this is in the latest Scottish Widows Saving and Investment Report.
It finds overall retirement savings have hit an all-time low, with only 46 percent of working people in the UK saving enough for their retirement. It reveals stark differences between people's expectations and reality.
Despite a big fall in retirement savings, it seems that people's aspirations for their pension income have actually increased by £200 from 2011 to 2012. The survey findings show that the average level of annual income people would feel comfortable living on at 70 years-old is now £24,500 compared to £24,300 in 2011. But the savings rates reported are unlikely to be able to produce a pension at age 65 of more than half that figure. Moreover 41 percent say they would like to retire at age 60.
That is not all. More than one-in-five (22%) of people in work aged over 30 and earning more that £10k are saving nothing at all for their retirement.
This is evidence of great heterogeneity of behaviour, with some households optimising like the model says, but as many failing to do so. But what it does show clearly is that intertemporal optimisation is not at the heart of the real economy.
How, then, can we put any faith in an economic model that assumes everything to be driven by universal intertemporal optimisation of consumption by a single representative consumer?
Surely a truly scientific model that would have some chance of successfully tracking the real world would try to model the actual behaviour of real people. That means a statistical approach that captures behaviour and allows for heterogeneity - "by and large and on the average" was a phrase used by old Keynesians for this kind of behavioural economics.
Many commentators have claimed that there is no austerity because there is still a large budget deficit. If the government is spending more than it receives in taxes then there must be - in effect - a fiscal stimulus. Therefore it is a myth that the government is pursuing an austerity policy because the real cuts have not started yet.
A government budget deficit might simply reflect the fact the economy is in recession and does not in itself mean the government is adopting a Keynesian fiscal policy. In a recession tax revenues fall and benefit spending increases naturally - the so-called automatic stabilisers - and the govenment finds itself with a deficit without having any stimulus policy- the situation in the UK currently.


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Know your tolerance on chemicals. Remember that when dealing with pest problems, you will also have to deal and bear with various types of chemicals. In connection with this, you have to ask and also the company the sorts of chemicals they normally use. A lot of companies use numerous chemicals which is to be harmful for those having respiratory problems and those who are sensitive with allergens along with chemicals.
You'll find customer reviews and also ratings in the company that you need to research and read. The higher Business Bureau may help you in this task. Call them and have if there are some outstanding complaints filed to your prospective bug elimination company.
You need to to guage everything in regards to the company when you speak to its representative. See whether the corporation is licensed and request for for appropriate documentation. A licensed Operator should be present in a hundred miles from the office from the company. Several states require for exterminators to have passed two written exams prior to being certified.
When it comes to your contract with the business, make sure you've read and understand each and every detail of it. Determine diet plan visit that you just are obliged to pay for, when you're gonna pay, and the visits in the exterminator to your property. You need to also seek out exclusions, should there be any, and also guarantees.


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Music Music Editor Music Features Music Reviews Muse
Remembering My Old Friend Sam
I just turned around and he was gone... Beth Colquhoun discusses the new Netflix documentary The Two Killings of Sam Cooke
Wednesday 6 Mar 2019 Beth Colquhoun
Photo Credit: Netflix
Netflix has earned a reputation for its extraordinary tales and documentaries that have shaken its audience for their diverse and thrilling subjects. Recently they have covered new ground of the Civil Rights Movement of the late 1950s-60s through the life and death of soul singer, Sam Cooke. Coined the "King of Soul", Sam Cooke reached new heights for African-Americans, during this time elevating his political consciousness with his music.
The Two Killings of Sam Cooke tells the story of his hugely successful career as a soul artist and political activist, right through to his murder. Held with great suspicion, his death also held the symbol for the death of a movement and belief system that thrived in his life. Sam Cooke was self-aware of the racial system within America and aimed to influence a culture much bigger than himself – earning him the Songwriters Hall of Fame Towering Song Award in 2013 for his iconic track 'A Change is Gonna Come.' This anthem underpins Sam Cooke's aspiration in life and is evident in this recent Netflix documentary. Directed by Kelly Duane de la Vega, the documentary introduces new real-life footage, even the emergency phone call made after his shooting in 1964 at only age 33. "Part of his legacy was hijacked by the way he died," states Kelly Duane de la Vega. "He was an incredible musical artist, but just as important was the way he contributed to the Civil Rights Movement and embodied the idea of an African-American artist having power in the record industry. It was a seedy end, and for some people, that's where the conversation ended."
Sam Cooke led an incredible life, beginning his musical career in a gospel choir and performing with his siblings, called The Singing Children. It wasn't long before he was scouted to perform with Highways QC at 15 and replaced R.H Harris as lead singer for The Soul Stirrers. When Cooke began his solo career, he instantly became a household name with 28 songs in the top 40. It is this incredible achievement that created such animosity and complexities in mid-nineteenth-century America. With 28 tracks in the R&B/Hip Hip Billboard top 40, Sam Cooke was an influential presence in all homes. Yet his music varied with his audience. When listening to Sam Cooke Live at the Harlem Square Club it is easy to hear a difference between his live performance and his chart records, performed on shows like The Ed Sullivan Show. Sam Cooke's gospel roots were never truly accepted by mainstream culture and were toned down for popular tracks. His background in gospel music thrives on stage in performances such as 'Live at Harlem's Square Club' with an acceptance of similar gospel music backgrounds. It is a great shame to know that limitations existed due to the racial barriers that cultivated America in the 1950s.
Sam Cooke's awareness of these barriers became a political motivation for both his music and life. However, while enforcing a non-segregated audience and refusing to sit on a 'Jim Crow bus', Netflix's documentary reveals how Cooke struggled to even get a ride into the city from any white taxi drivers. This incredible injustice frustrated Sam Cooke and his close circle of political activists. Yet this may be the reason for his death. The documentary questions the legitimacy of the accidental shooting of Sam Cooke as some believe his death was constructed as a way to silence a threat to white power. Although his name is not mentioned these losses of inspirational lives are acknowledged in Marvin Gaye's 'Abraham'; Marvin and John made the simplicity and rhetoric of the verses underpin the repetitive loss of life-changing people. The documentary tells us of great injustices suffered by Sam Cooke due to his race, despite his wealth and appreciation within music. With racial tensions at their peak in the South, he was still determined to tour it to give representation and enforce his political thought. His experiences on the tour were demonstrative of the racist culture that was rooted in America. It was following these experiences that he decided to boycott any shows that hosted a segregated audience. He explained: "I hope by refusing to play to a segregated audience, it will help to break down racial segregation here." While being threatened by the prominent Ku Klux Klan, this was a bold move, yet just one of the incredible and bold choices Sam Cooke made throughout his life.
His connections and friendships with Cassius Clay (Mohammed Ali), Malcolm X and Jim Brown became a threat to white America, with his death believed to be at the pinnacle of immense change. It is no shock that three months following his murder came the death of Malcolm X, and four years later, Martin Luther King Jr. Sam Cooke's life and death resonate with the Civil Rights Movement and the African- American community to this day. It is no wonder that he inspired such amazing artists as Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Otis Reading and James Brown. His legacy laid the foundations for change with a boundless power. For this very reason Sam Cooke was elected into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, only just after the 25-year waiting limit for eligibility since a first record, and the Songwriters Hall of Fame the following year. Soon after in 1999 he was awarded the Grammys' Lifetime Achievement Award. Sam Cooke's incredibly bold achievements and milestones have earned him the equally bold name of King of Soul, and as the man who created soul throughout the decades the timing of this documentary release could not have been better. The relevance of the issues within the documentary rattle the core, as the racial tensions and subjugation of the African-American community during Sam Cooke's life hold uncanny parallels to today's movements such as 'Black Lives Matter.'
The issue of police brutality aimed at black citizens is still prolific, resonating the eerie questioning of Cooke's song 'A Change Is Gonna Come', and even more so, the actual advancement of racial relations in America. Netflix's new documentary The Two Killings of Sam Cooke not only shines a light on injustices in 1950/60s America but shows in retrospect the harsh prejudices that are still prevalent today in many forms beyond those of race. The 70-minute special is incredibly well produced, showing both sides to Sam Cooke's public personas, yet one underlying feature to his character prevails: his will for change and justice
MUSE Album of Choice: Sam Cooke Live at The Harlem Square Club
Beth Colquhoun
Music Editor ( Oct 2017 to Jul 2019 )
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