Bernanke's Frustrated? ... Well Boo-Hoo

By, Chris Rossini

In a speech given on Jan. 3, The Maestro The Hero, Ben Bernanke, mentioned an area that has puzzled him in his central planning adventures:

Disappointing productivity growth accordingly must be added to the list of reasons that economic growth has been slower than hoped.

Now, to the average person, that may seem like an innocent statement. The use of words are something you'd expect to hear from those who "run the economy." But to close observers, it's really a disastrous mess.

First of all, as Murray Rothbard pointed out in Man, Economy & State:

“What is so good about growth?” The econ­omists, discoursing scientifically about growth, have illegitimately smuggled an ethical judgment into their science—an ethical judgment that remains unanalyzed, as if it were self-evident. But why should growth be the highest value for which we can strive? What is the ethical justification? There is no doubt about the fact that growth, taken over as another dubious metaphor from biology, “sounds” good to most people, but this hardly constitutes an ade­quate ethical analysis. Many things are considered as good, but on the free market every man must choose between different quantities of them and the price for those forgone. Similarly, growth, as we shall presently see, must be balanced and weighed against competing values. Given due consideration, growth would be considered by few people as the only absolute value...

So when Bernanke says that "economic growth has been slower than hoped," the question must be asked: "Hoped by whom?"....And the answer is Bernanke & his central planning buddies.

Rothbard sets it straight on how things should work:

In a free market, for example, every person chooses how much future growth he wants as compared to present consumption. (my emphasis)

Bernanke then pulls out the excuse card to explain why his "hopes" were not met:

Incidentally, the slow pace of productivity gains early in the recovery was not evident until well after the fact because of large data revisions--an illustration of the frustrations of real-time policymaking. (my emphasis)

Should we be pulling out our hankies? Or perhaps a violin?

In this corner of the Internet, The Hero is not going to get encouragement like "Go get 'em next time Ben!" .... or "Invest in stronger computers that can crunch those numbers faster".... or "Work Krugman harder next time to come up with the right combination to the lock."

Sorry...there are plenty of other outlets that will assist in keeping the delusions alive.

Here, we'll tell the truth. Bernanke, as well as every central planner before and after him, is engaged in a futile act. Central Planning of economic life only leads to the destruction of economic life. There are no side roads, or short cuts that will work. It's a one way, step-by-step slog, to a dead end called economic ruin.

Bernanke thinks he has "frustrations"?

How about the rest of the world, that have to live lives as lab rats in his grand "experiments". How about economic life being like a constant ride through a washing machine?

Boom / Bust / Boom / Bust / Boom / Bust ...

How about the "frustration" of constantly watching your bills go up? With every TRILLION that the Fed creates in its "experiments," it sticks a dagger into our wallets and bank accounts.

How about the "frustration" of having to get a second or even third job? Or what about the "frustration" of chronic unemployment because the Fed won't let the market clear all of the malinvestments that the central bank itself has created? What about the "frustration" of watching loss producing crony companies stay in business because of the Fed bailouts.

It's one thing to sit in a marble palace and be "frustrated" to see your delusions of grandeur not work out. But the real "frustration" lies with the population at large (minus the cronies, of course) who have to suffer the abuse until the day finally comes when we can End The Fed.

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