Open Letter to Young Leftists.

Dear Young Leftists,

It's been ten years since the housing bubble burst in the US back in 2006, followed by the Great/Long Recession.

Time flies, as they say.

Dave Oliver: Vote Down the TPP.

The ACTU's Dave Oliver is sending this email:

Our PM is working his hardest to ram through a dangerous deal. We need to stop him.

Right now, Malcolm Turnbull is swanning around the United States, pushing for a trade deal that could cost you your job, your health and our democracy: the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).

When he returns he'll set his sights on our Senators and try to get them to rubber-stamp it.

Luckily, the Liberals don’t have the numbers in the Senate to pass this dangerous deal if Labor, the Greens and the crossbench unite to block it.

Will you sign the petition calling on all Senators from all parties to reject this dangerous deal and stand up for Australian jobs, health and democracy?

We have to defeat the TPP because:

• it allows corporations to sue Australia just for making laws in the public interest (like lowering the cost of medicines for the sick).
• it will force Australia to take even more workers on dodgy visas, undermining our wages and conditions and allowing corporations to make a killing off the backs of exploited foreign workers.
• it says it will protect workers and the environment but is vague and almost unenforceable.

If Malcolm gets his way, the Australian parliament will rubberstamp this corporate power grab. We have to stop him. The Senate has to stop him.

Tell Senators they need to stand with the people, not the corporates.

Dave Oliver
ACTU Secretary

Speaking on my behalf: the Liberal government can shove their TPP up their backside. I demand Labor, Greens, and crossbenchers to stop that abomination.

If you guys don't stop the TPP, I hereby give you my word: in the next election I'll vote Liberal, even if the Antichrist is in their list. I'll do that for the first time in my life: if you can betray me, I will betray you.

Romer's Waves.

Paul Romer's "The Trouble With Macroeconomics" gave the blogosphere heaps to comment.

You didn't read Romer's paper? No worries! Noah Smith ("The New Heavyweight Macro Critics", September 14) summarises it, in a Reader's Digest kind of way. What does Smith think about it? Hard to say, other than "Ouch. He also calls various typical DSGE model elements names like 'phlogiston', 'aether', and 'caloric' " Smith remains safely non-committal ("committal" would sound dangerously like "commie", I suppose). Maybe one could sum up his view as "totally awesome, dude".

Romer's Magical Creatures.

(source)

I ain’t no economist. So, it is more with a kind of morbid fascination than with any real deep understanding that I have been following Paul Romer’s critique of economics.

Things began last year, with “Mathiness in the Theory of Economic Growth”, when Prof. Romer took aim at growth theory (one of his areas of expertise). Now, with “The Trouble with Macroeconomics” he extends his critique to macroeconomics (particularly to RBC and the much maligned DSGE).

Bits and Pieces (ix)

(source)

Julia Baird (above) writes that educated, qualified and experienced professional women lacking self-confidence should follow the example of much more confident, but less educated, less qualified and less experienced white male colleagues:

Liberal Democracies' Debates.

[A]

If you are a discontent with capitalism, globalization, and/or free trade chances are you’ve found the exact phrase “lifted millions of people out of poverty” as a predicate in a sentence with capitalism, globalization, and/or free trade as subject.