Game time is over, my team won, so I'm a happy camper. That's good news for you analytics, because I'm going to be charitable:
Which 160 economists think "the problem from the beginning was letting government have a hand in the matter to begin with?"
Here is a link with a letter signed by about 160 economists which is against the new law. Is that the one you are referring to?
The letter says absolutely nothing about them thinking that the problem is the government having a hand in this. Since the government wasn't even involved in the private-label MBS's or the OTC credit default swaps, blaming government involvement in the sub-prime mortgage/economic-system meltdown doesn't even make sense.
You really ought to spend less time reading blogs of people who are either ignorant or are trying to mislead you and more time reading what educated people have to say on the matter.
Analytics, didn't I tell you to hold on to your horses, and that I would be with you soon enough? Your arrogance is only matched by your
own belligerence, and at least
stupid is how you should
feel after reading what's below. I mean if you really think I have been reading up on "uneducated"
blogs then you're only showing how unfamiliar you are with the controversy amongst economists.
There was a petition signed by 166 economists urging the Congress not to pass a bail out bill and then there was another petition signed by over 100 economists urging the contrary (that number has probably increased from teh other day). What this shows is that, evidently, there are plenty of highly educated people disagreeing with one another over the causes of the current crisis, which would be expected to anyone who knows anything about economics. It isn't an exact science. Predicting accurate economic forecasts is only slightly more reliable than a weather forecast. Explaining past economic phenomenon has resulted in the same cornucopia of various opinions.
But never fear.
While silly, yet reputable, economists disagree with one another and continue to disagree respectfully, no one should disagree with our resident armchair "economist," analytics, who says he has "proved" everything beyond a doubt, lest he be an
ignoramus!
Now as far as government being the primary cause of this problem, which is why analytics called me an "uneducated ignoramus," please allow me to direct your attentions to uneducated ignoramus' who have helped "mislead" me to this conclusion:
Uneducated Ignoramus
#1 Jeffrey A. Miron is senior lecturer in economics at Harvard University. A Libertarian, he was one of 166 academic economists who signed a letter to congressional leaders last week opposing the government bailout plan.
"The fact that government bears such a huge responsibility for the current mess means any response should eliminate the conditions that created this situation in the first place, not attempt to fix bad government with more government...
So what should the government do? Eliminate those policies that generated the current mess. This means, at a general level, abandoning the goal of home ownership independent of ability to pay. This means, in particular, getting rid of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, along with policies like the Community Reinvestment Act that pressure banks into subprime lending."
Please note that the article above, written by a reputable economist whose name appears
on the petition, refers directly to the petition of economists I initially referred to, so its reasonable to assume his reasoning would be similar to that shared by the other 165 economists who joined together for the same cause. But let's move to what Analytics would only consider to be uneducated ignoramus
#2:
Thomas J. DiLorenzo professor of economics at Loyola College in Maryland said,
The thousands of mortgage defaults and foreclosures in the "subprime" housing market (i.e., mortgage holders with poor credit ratings) is the direct result of thirty years of government policy that has forced banks to make bad loans to un-creditworthy borrowers.
Uneducated ignoramus
#3, writing to his liberal friends who wanted to blame deregulation:
Steven Horwitz, Economics Professor at St. Lawrence University:
"Consider instead that the problems of this mess were caused by the very kinds of government regulation that you now propose. Consider instead that effects of the profit motive that you decry depend upon the incentives that institutions, regulations, and policies create, which in this case led profit-seekers to do great damage. Consider instead that the regulations that may have been the cause were supported by, as they have often been throughout US history, the very firms being regulated, mostly because they worked to said firms' benefit, even as they screwed the rest of us. Consider all of this as you ask for more of the same in the name of fixing the problem. And finally, consider why you would ever imagine that those with wealth and power wouldn't rig a new regulatory process in their favor."
Uneducated ignoramus
#4:
Greg Mankiw, professor of Economics at Harvard said,
Indeed, the problem goes back at least as far as the Johnson administration, which helped set up a housing finance system that was always fundamentally flawed. If Senator Obama really wants to transcend partisan politics, as he would sometimes have us believe, he might want to give a slightly more balanced view of the history of how this all started. He also might want to take note that the Bush administration warned about some of these problems five years ago and had its reform efforts stymied by prominent members of Senator Obama's own party."
Uneducated ignoramus
#5 comes from
Stanford, apparently another institute of lower learning:
Stanford economist Thomas Sowell said,
"Nothing could more painfully demonstrate what is wrong with Congress than the current financial crisis. Among the Congressional "leaders" invited to the White House to devise a bailout "solution" are the very people who have for years created the risks that have now come home to roost. Five years ago, Barney Frank vouched for the "soundness" of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and said "I do not see" any "possibility of serious financial losses to the treasury."
And then there is uneducated ignoramus
#6:
Peter J. Wallison is the Arthur F. Burns Fellow in Financial Policy Studies at AEI:
"The Democrats are wrong in claiming that financial services deregulation is to blame for the current financial crisis--if anything, the financial sector has seen increased regulation since the savings and loan collapse in the 1980s. The lax supervision of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which Republicans sought to strengthen in 2005, is the true culprit of this financial crisis." -
So attack
me all you want. But ask yourself if my view is supported by educated economists. In the meantime, consider also the possibility that analytics
doesn't really know everything, no matter what his ego claims to have "proved."
PS: I will post this in the thread you created in off-topic where you can proceed with your slurs and misrepresentations.
“All knowledge of reality starts from experience and ends in it...Propositions arrived at by purely logical means are completely empty as regards reality." - Albert Einstein