Oct
30th
Thu
30th
The Dow-Jones Industrial Average has spent 25 of the past 40 years—62%—between 800 and 1250 or between 8000 and 12500. These ranges comprise roughly 25% of the (logarithmic) total range of the Dow as a function of time. It really looks like there may something special about the nominal value of a 1 followed by a bunch of zeros. This is disturbing to me as an economist.
(via Grasping Reality with Both Hands: The Semi-Daily Journal Economist Brad DeLong)
Oct
19th
Sun
19th
When visiting with the Bishop of Missouri and with Ralph, my current employment situation came up. I acknowledged the far-reaching uncertainty that characterizes Margaret’s and my future, and noted that for career academics, a one year contract is a mixed blessing: all the anxiety of unemployment, with none of the leisure.
Oct
14th
Tue
14th
Dare to be silly
If you want to publish a paper in economic theory, there is a safe approach: make a conceptually minor but mathematically difficult extension to some familiar model. Because the basic assumptions of the model are already familiar, people will not regard them as strange; because you have done something technically difficult, you will be respected for your demonstration of firepower. Unfortunately, you will not have added much to human knowledge.
What I found myself doing in the new trade theory was pretty much the opposite. I found myself using assumptions that were unfamiliar, and doing very simple things with them. Doing this requires a lot of self-confidence, because initially people (especially referees) are almost certain not simply to criticize your work but to ridicule it. A
[Andy Martin] is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked in the 1970s after a psychiatric finding of “moderately severe character defect manifested by well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.”
