Economist of the Year: Peter Schiff
The award of economist of the year should go either to an economist who has made path breaking new discoveries in the science, or who has advanced the general level of economic understanding on the planet. Schiff falls into the latter category. His consistent and clear presentation of sound economics that proved correct in forecasting events over recent months, in the face of laughter and derision, will raise curiosity across the land about the business cycle theory, specifically, Austrian Business Cycle Theory.
Here's a YouTube video of Schiff battling mainstream nonsense. It puts everything into perspective:
Inside Operator of the Year: Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson
In short order, Pauslon was able to convince Congress to give him $350 billion to buy up distressed mortgages. Paulson managed to disperse the entire $350 billion to his crony buddies without buying one distressed mortgage. In a remarkable disrespect for Congress and the public at large, Paulson also changed, on a near daily basis, the reasons he was distributing the funds in the fashion he was.
Inflationist of the Year (Also known as the Robert Mugabe Award): Ben Bernanke
After nearly halting money printing through out the Summer of 2008, Bernanke has reversed engines and tells us that his monetary policy is now one of "quantitative" money supply control, which apparently is Bernanke's attempt to replace "speed of light" with "speed of money printing" in Einsten's equation E=MC2. Over the last three months, Bernanke has increased money supply, as measured by M2 nsa, at an annualized rate in excess of 20%. Bernanke's effort will result in a change by the end of 2009 from the belief that "cash is king" to the knowledge that cash, in the form of paper dollars, is toilet paper.
A Specific Application of Employment, Interest and Money
ReplyDeleteAbstract:
This tract makes a critical analysis of credit based, free market economy, Capitalism, and proves that its dysfunctions are the result of the existence of credit.
It shows that income / wealth disparity, cause and consequence of credit and of the level of long-term interest-rates, is the first order hidden variable, possibly the only one, of economic development.
It solves most of the puzzles of macro economy: among which Business Cycles, Stagflation, Greenspan Conundrum, Deflation and Keynes' Liquidity Trap...
It shows that no fiscal or monetary policy, including the barbaric quantitative easing will get us out of depression.
It shows that Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, Karl Marx and Alan Greenspan don't contradict each other but that they each bring a meaningful contribution to a same framework for understanding macro economy.
It proposes a credit free, free market economy as a solution that would correct all of those dysfunctions.
In This Age of Turbulence People Want an Exit Strategy out of Credit, an Adventure in a New World Economic Order.
Read It.
I don't consider myself an expert on economics and know I have a lot to learn. That being said I must agree with you pick of Peter Schiff for the 2008 EPJ Award.
ReplyDeleteSchiff's "Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets" is written in plain jargon-free language. For the reader, it is full of "why didn't I think of that before" moments, many of which seem obvious only in hindsight. That is a surefire sign of a good book.