Monthly Archives: May 2000

Self-interest Rates

This entry was posted in Listener, Macroeconomics & Money on by .

Listener: 27 May, 2000

Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money;

New Zealand’s economic debate can be bizarre. Take the recent rises in the Reserve Bank base interest rate. Hardly anybody made the point that world interest rates are rising. The American Fed(eral Reserve Bank) is putting up its base rate, the European Central Bank is too, so is Australia’s Reserve Bank (RBA), and so on. Can we ignore a rising tide? The rest of the world could then borrow unlimited quantities from the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), a scenario too absurd to contemplate. Something horrible would happen to our monetary system and economy if we ignore what happens overseas.

Delayed Impact

This entry was posted in Listener, Macroeconomics & Money on by .

Listener 13 May, 2000.

Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money;

To understand the consequences of dramatic change in share prices, think instead about housing. Suppose you are told the value of your house has doubled. Suppose it makes no difference to your behaviour (except a bit of skiting, disguised as grumbling about higher local authority rates). When sometime later you are told your house price has halved, it wont matter much either (except you have another excuse for grumbling).

the Anti-economist Papers, by Paul Bieleski

This entry was posted in History of Ideas, Methodology, Philosophy, Listener on by .

Listener: 6 May, 2000.

Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy;

The economics profession had a high standing 40 years ago. Clergymen would mention that before they took orders they took an arts degree in economics. An oft repeated joke was the accountant who wanted to be an economist but did not have the personality. It is ages since a priest made that confession to me, and today the joke reverses the professions. It is not that today’s economists lack the passions that drove their predecessors. Rather, the morality has changed, and with it the public perception. Whatever the individual ethics of today’s economists, the discipline has been increasingly developed around the notion that people primarily pursue their self-interest. Even altruism is marginalised, explained as another way of pursuing selfishness. Economics may be the only “profession” that does not have any code of ethics.