Categories:
Monetary Policy
David Leonhardt is insightful.
you would also find a sizable group of economists who thought the Fed could and should do far more than it was doing. This group, known as doves, tilts liberal, though it includes conservatives as well. If anything, it can probably claim a larger number of big-name economists — J. Bradford DeLong, Paul Krugman (an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times), Christina D. Romer, Scott Sumner and Mark Thoma, among others — than the camp that believes the Fed has done too much.
Scott Sumner, you are a Big Name! I credit blogging.
I am in the dove camp myself. I don’t believe in AD, but if AD is true, then the Fed can do something about it. Read Leonhardt’s whole piece.
READER COMMENTS
Eric
Aug 29 2011 at 11:14am
“On one side are people like Ben S. Bernanke, the Fed chairman, who defend both what the Fed has done and what it hasn’t done. On the other side are the so-called inflation hawks, who say the Fed has been far too aggressive. Rick Perry, the Texas governor and arguably the Republican presidential front-runner, offered a particularly blunt version of this criticism when he recently accused Mr. Bernanke of flirting with treason.”
Anyone passage find this disingenuous? Surely there are free-market economists who don’t believe in the Fed “doing more”. It seems like that chose Perry to discredit that position.
effem
Aug 29 2011 at 11:20am
“I don’t believe in AD, but if AD is true, then the Fed can do something about it.”
Arnold, I think this deserves more thought. If AD isn’t “true” and the Fed tried to create it anyway I believe we run the risk of large-scale social unrest and loss of reserve currency status. This is not simply some economic experiment – it is a full bet on the faith in the USD and in our current way of macroeconomic thinking. Investors already show signs of wanting to flee fiat currencies (as evidenced by gold) – do we really want to push capital further down that path?
Eric
Aug 29 2011 at 3:38pm
“that chose” should be “they chose”.
AC
Aug 29 2011 at 7:16pm
I’m sure you have before, but can you elaborate on your dove position?
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