Reddit reviews Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism

>You continue to go on about your single rebuttal, that ignores the half a dozen other quotes from Krugman the OP cited.

The things I've said above do rebut all of those other points about interest rate cuts. Interest rate cuts themselves are not the main cause of bubbles, no matter how much you want to believe it.

>Your self-absorbed approach to intellectual debate is exactly the attitude that is so wrong with modern intellectual discourse

Look in the mirror. You Austrian idiots think that you are smarter than everyone else.

>why a fucking idiot like Krugman is still listened to after repeatedly calling for low interest rates to create a boom in housing

lol. Do you really think Krugman had any influence over Greenspan? Remember, Greenspan comes from a libertarian ideology background (so I guess the main lesson here is don't put such people in positions of power, right?). Also, as has been said a million times now: Krugman was predicting Greenspan's actions based on what Greenspan was likely thinking. You are dishonest if you say otherwise at this point because the evidence is irrefutable.

>I stated that Keynesians are fucking reckless and stupid for not realizing that artificial booms created by low interest rates inevitably lead to bubbles and crashes.

You still are ignoring the numerous other times in which low interest rates didn't lead to a crash. I guess evidence only counts if it supports your case, right?

>highly specific prediction explaining what sector of the economy was experiencing a bubble, what sub-sector of that sector, and for what reasons.

Ron Paul said nothing about credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations, corruption from the rating agencies, overleveraging from the big banks in the shadow banking system, liar loans, and the psychology of bubbles (e.g. the house flipping shows). As for the GSEs, they existed for half a century without causing an implosion in the housing market. Paul's explanation is simply wrong.

Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism by Shiller and Akerloff

Predictably Irrational by Daniel Ariely

One Economics, Many Recipes By Dani Rodrik

Each book encourages readers to think differently about economics than the standard policy models dictate. The first two focus on the role of human psychology in economic decision making, while Rodrik's work is one of the preeminent works on second-best development economics, which looks to find policy solutions that are specific to the social, political and economic context in which they will be implemented.

Shiller's a pretty smart guy - I recommend his work "Animal Spirits" for a general idea of the complicated and irrational nature of market forces.

http://www.amazon.com/Animal-Spirits-Psychology-Economy-Capitalism/dp/0691142335

Wait, is animal spirits an offensive term?

I'm the one being strawmanned here, he wrote an entire post painting me as an anarchist because I said the government should play a limited role in the economy, and then he ad hom'd me with the "you guys won a twofer". 9 upvotes, 0 downvotes.

You then strawman me and claim that I pretended my side was perfect, when I said I "tend to favor," which implies impartiality. I recognize the flaws of a completely free market.

Reddit is very intolerant and biased against conservativism. Even if I state plain facts that challenge the dogma I will be censored, as if downvotes are to punish dissent.

Certainly. Your trust argument is similar to one story detailed in "Animal Spirits" by Shiller and Akerlof, if you're interested. Animal spirits would in fact be a different (and older and somewhat archaic) term for it.

We're not certain. But take a close look at what happened in the week after Lehman's collapse. The commercial paper market evaporated -- and that's serious business. Try running General Electric without access to short term credit, and try living in a world in which GE's survival is in doubt. The money market funds were in danger of utter collapse -- which would have had such horrible and utterly unimaginable consequences. I was and remain scared to death about what that period suggested could have happened.