Book Review: GDP

GDP: A Brief but Affectionate History by Professor Diane Coyle offers an interesting popular history of the concept of gross domestic product (GDP). GDP is a mental construct, and is the result of somewhat arbitrary decisions. The book discusses the history of the idea, tied in with economic history as well as the history of economics.

Presentation At MMT Conference

I will be doing a presentation at the First International Conference of Modern Monetary Theory in Kansas City in September 2017 (conference dates are September 21-24, website: http://www.mmtconference.org/). I will be presenting an introduction to my Python stock-flow consistent models package -- sfc_models. This article is a rough draft of what I think the slides will look like.

Book Review: The Reformation In Economics

Philip Pilkington published "The Reformation in Economics: A Deconstruction and Reconstruction of Economic Theory" in 2016. It is an ambitious book, outlining the structural flaws of mainstream economic theory. He discusses the potential replacement theory, but this reconstruction is somewhat overshadowed by the deconstruction.

Bank Of Canada Hawkishness Ramping Up

Developed central bank hawkishness has been increasing over the past weeks, signalling a new consensus (or groupthink) among global policymakers. Such a shift should not be too surprising, given the biases of central bankers. In particular, the shift by the Bank of Canada is a reversion to historical form; whether or not it will be disastrous remains to be seen.

Book Review: What's Wrong With Money?

Michael Ashton is a inflation product specialist who was involved in the development of the inflation derivatives market. He published What's Wrong With Money: The Biggest Bubble of them All last year. I essentially answered the question in his title with the title of my last report -- "Abolish Money (From Economics)!" The problem with money is that it leads to dubious economic analysis. Ashton is a relatively old school Monetarist, and the book inherits the weaknesses of Monetarism. However, the financial/personal finance aspects of the book are interesting.