- I'm reading some of Friedman's "A Program for Monetary Stability" for the paper, and I thought this was a really fantastic conclusion:
"These [Friedman's economic policy recommendations] would be no mean accomplishments. But they would not provide a panacea for economic problems. Money is important, but only, in John Stuard Mill's words, "as a contrivance for sparing time and labour." There are other sources of uncertainty and instability. No doubt they will continue to produce recurrent fluctuations in economic activity and from time to time will give rise to more serious problems of economic adjustment. Monetary policy is but one segment of total governmental policy let alone of the far wider range of private and public economic arrangements that affect the course of events. And even if we could improve governmental policy in other areas as much as our limited knowledge and understanding would permit, some uncertainty and instability would remain. After all, uncertainty and instability are unavoidable concomitants of progress and change. They are on face of a coin of which the other is freedom."- Jeff Tucker has a great quote from Turgot on writing (Is it just me or is Jeff Tucker pretty awesome? I've been linking him a lot lately! If only he weren't so damned dogmatic a libertarian! Nobody's perfect I suppose.):
"Genius, whose course is at first slow, unmarked, and buried in the general oblivion into which time precipitates human affairs, emerges from obscurity with them by means of the invention of writing. Priceless invention!—which seemed to give wings to those peoples who first possessed it, enabling them to outdistance other nations. Incomparable invention!—which rescues from the power of death the memory of great men and models of virtue, unites places and times, arrests fugitive thoughts and guarantees them a lasting existence, by means of which the creations, opinions, experiences, and discoveries of all ages are accumulated, to serve as a foundation and foothold for posterity in raising itself ever higher!"
If you ever have the chance to visit Monticello, look carefully at the busts in the front hall. Turgot was one of the political economists that Jefferson felt deserving of gracing his home with. Also, quickly scan the books in his library as you walk through it (I assume they don't change the order very often!) at about eye-level, right as you walk in, you'll see Jefferson's copy of Malthus.
The New School for Social Research's page on Turgot is here.
If only you weren't so dogmatic a Keynesian!
ReplyDeleteOn the "practical men" quote.
ReplyDeleteOne of the things that has always troubled me about it that quote is the portion which is most often left out:
"Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back."
The thing of course is that the "academic scribbler[s]" in question were generally quite practical themselves - they were most often not mere academics. Plato made his many dangerous voyages to Sicily to advise a monarch there; Montesquieu cut his teeth the French court system; Machiavelli was of course a long standing member of his polity's foreign service; John Locke sought exile for his involvement in English politics as part of the Shaftesbury Circle; etc.
Anyway, the phrase has always stuck in my craw because he seems to be rather arrogantly dismissing the ideas, thoughts, questions, etc. of the past as simply the work of men cloistered away from the real world.
Because of the phrase "some defunct economist" and "some academic scribbler"? I'm not sure either implies being cloistered away does it? "Some defunct economist" simply means an economist that has become passe in the discipline but still influences the world. We can think of the Classical school, the real bills doctrine, Marx, etc. here for Keynes's time.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure that because "practical" is applied to people listening it follows that the opposite of practical applies to the thinkers.
Anyway - it would be odd for Keynes of all people to make this mistake. He worked for the foreign office in India, the peace negotiations after WWI, he worked with the French on their currency issues, the Treasury, the Bank of England, the Treasury again on how to finance the second world war, he advised the American government and I would imagine others, and he of course was integral in the negotiations that would set up the World Bank and the IMF.
I suppose what I'm saying is I take your point and agree with it, but I don't think he's saying what you think he's saying.
"Anyway - it would be odd for Keynes of all people to make this mistake. He worked for the foreign office in India, the peace negotiations after WWI, he worked with the French on their currency issues, the Treasury, the Bank of England, the Treasury again on how to finance the second world war, he advised the American government and I would imagine others, and he of course was integral in the negotiations that would set up the World Bank and the IMF."
ReplyDeleteNot it wouldn't be odd for him to make this mistake - particularly if he knew very little about the biographies of past thinkers.
"Not it wouldn't be odd for him to make this mistake - particularly if he knew very little about the biographies of past thinkers."
ReplyDeleteWell we know he did know the biographies of past thinkers, but even if he didn't why do you think that wouldn't be odd? He certainly knew the biographies of contemporary thinkers. This seems to be one of those "no actually you're wrong" comments of yours that strikes me as being a little contextless. Reasons???
dkuehn,
ReplyDeleteThe point is that smart people with loads of experience are not above believing stupid things.