Global Economic Intersection
Advertisement
  • Home
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Investments
    • Invest in Amazon $250
  • Cryptocurrency
    • Best Bitcoin Accounts
    • Bitcoin Robot
      • Quantum AI
      • Bitcoin Era
      • Bitcoin Aussie System
      • Bitcoin Profit
      • Bitcoin Code
      • eKrona Cryptocurrency
      • Bitcoin Up
      • Bitcoin Prime
      • Yuan Pay Group
      • Immediate Profit
      • BitQH
      • Bitcoin Loophole
      • Crypto Boom
      • Bitcoin Treasure
      • Bitcoin Lucro
      • Bitcoin System
      • Oil Profit
      • The News Spy
      • Bitcoin Buyer
      • Bitcoin Inform
      • Immediate Edge
      • Bitcoin Evolution
      • Cryptohopper
      • Ethereum Trader
      • BitQL
      • Quantum Code
      • Bitcoin Revolution
      • British Trade Platform
      • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Reddit
    • Celebrities
      • Dr. Chris Brown Bitcoin
      • Teeka Tiwari Bitcoin
      • Russell Brand Bitcoin
      • Holly Willoughby Bitcoin
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Investments
    • Invest in Amazon $250
  • Cryptocurrency
    • Best Bitcoin Accounts
    • Bitcoin Robot
      • Quantum AI
      • Bitcoin Era
      • Bitcoin Aussie System
      • Bitcoin Profit
      • Bitcoin Code
      • eKrona Cryptocurrency
      • Bitcoin Up
      • Bitcoin Prime
      • Yuan Pay Group
      • Immediate Profit
      • BitQH
      • Bitcoin Loophole
      • Crypto Boom
      • Bitcoin Treasure
      • Bitcoin Lucro
      • Bitcoin System
      • Oil Profit
      • The News Spy
      • Bitcoin Buyer
      • Bitcoin Inform
      • Immediate Edge
      • Bitcoin Evolution
      • Cryptohopper
      • Ethereum Trader
      • BitQL
      • Quantum Code
      • Bitcoin Revolution
      • British Trade Platform
      • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Reddit
    • Celebrities
      • Dr. Chris Brown Bitcoin
      • Teeka Tiwari Bitcoin
      • Russell Brand Bitcoin
      • Holly Willoughby Bitcoin
No Result
View All Result
Global Economic Intersection
No Result
View All Result

The Interaction of Economists and Money Cranks in the Depression Years

admin by admin
June 17, 2017
in Uncategorized
0
0
SHARES
0
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

by Philip Pilkington

Article of the Week from Fixing the Economists

Recently I ran a post that briefly delved into the connection between Keynes and the money cranks of the 1920s and 1930s. There I showed that Keynes’ ideas cannot be said to have been influenced in any substantial way by the money cranks. Rather they were an outgrowth of a modifying of his earlier views, put forward in his Treatise on Money and taken from the Swedish economist Knut Wicksell.


Please share this article – Go to very top of page, right hand side for social media buttons.


In what follows I will draw upon an article by Robert Dimand entitled Cranks, Heretics and Macroeconomics in the 1930s. Dimand’s narrative is centered on a periodical that was started in the US in 1932 entitled Economic Forum. The goal of Economic Forum was to bring together open-minded economists and people who would otherwise be considered money cranks. Keynes was, of course, a contributor, as were the money cranks C.H. Douglas and Frederick Soddy.

It should be noted that back in England the money cranks were already getting a hearing. R.G. Hawtrey, who was then at the British Treasury, publicly debated Douglas and Lionel Robbins — hardly a progressive economic thinker — saw Douglas’ ideas as having enough validity that he devoted a major portion of his British Association address to analyse them.

Clearly the ideas of the money cranks were in the ether at the time, in both the US and in England. This is not surprising because the unemployment situation had become so bad and economists were having a desperately hard time explaining it. So, those who were attempting to explain it were met with attention by the economists — even if the latter often approached the ideas of the former with the intent of discrediting them.

All of this is important to understand because it allows us to see that Keynes was not the only one engaging with the money cranks in this era. Many economists were — including many economists who would be very unsympathetic to easy money policies and fiscal expansion. During the Depression, the money cranks became regulars on the economic circuit.

Those involved with the Economic Forum also launched clever schemes to bring mainstream economists into the fold and engage with money crank theories directly. William Trufant Foster, for example, offered a $5,000 prize to the economist who could best refute his crank book on money and profits which advocated massive public spending. Fifty professional economists responded with entries and Foster’s ideas would go on to have a major influence on the Roosevelt-appointed Federal Reserve president Marinner Eccles.

Many of the theories of the money cranks were flimsy at best, however, and some had markedly negative tendencies. C.H. Douglas’ theories of social credit were influenced by Medieval Scholastic ideas about a ‘Just Price’ and manifested a tendency to blame most of the world’s economic ills on ‘usury’. In the hands of their most famous proponent — the American fascist poet Ezra Pound — they were easily combined with virulent antisemitism and Nazi idealism.

Those like Pound — who was later diagnosed as having a narcissistic, megalomaniacal personality by psychiatrists after his mental breakdown which was precipitated by his incarceration for treason after the war — who supported the theories did not respond well to rational criticism. F.S. Flint, for example, pointed out that there were many technical flaws in the argument — most notably the theory’s inability to recognise that interest paid is also interest income received — and Pound flew into an irrational rage saying that Flint had no right to comment on matters of algebra which were far above him (i.e. Flint). Flint was, of course, a mathematician employed as a statistician by the Ministry of Labour, while Pound was a mentally unstable poet who lived a life of wandering in search of fascist ideals.

Pound became something of a propagandist for the money cranks in this era. He gave lectures in Italian under invitation by Angelo Sraffa — Pierro Sraffa’s father! Pound’s writings contain bitter vitriol against Keynes; vitriol that comes across as highly personalised and reflective of Pound’s mental instability. But one gets the distinct impression that Pound was threatened by Keynes’ embrace of reasonably similar policies at the time — the narcissism of small differences and all that.

Pound’s presence in the debates shows up two strong traits of money cranks: namely, that when errors in their theories are pointed out they ignore them and get angry with the person making them and also that they have a strong emotional attachment to the theories that borders on zealousness. This is markedly different from the discourse of real economics wherein when people disagree with each other it is generally not over the acceptance or dismissal of logical errors but over the interpretation of various aspects of theory.

For example, New Classical macroeconomists will not argue that fiscal stimulus does not lead to increased GDP by accounting identity but instead will furnish a behavioral theory that negates any impact this might have (i.e. Ricardian equivalence). This gives economic discussion a level of academic rigour that the discussions of the money cranks lack entirely. In the land of the money crank once the theory is accepted as True it cannot be revised in light of evidence, whether logical or empirical, to the contrary.

Other cranks tended to get angry because they saw professional economists as poaching their ideas. Soddy was enraged that Irving Fisher’s proposal for 100% reserve banking was identical in many respects to the one he had put forward ten years earlier. Of course, Fisher never made claims to originality and listed Soddy’s work in the bibliography along with other similar historical work — such as a proposal from 1823! Many of the money crank ideas that were embraced by economists during the Depression had been around since the time when economics as a discipline started.

The Economic Forum also carried a wide range of other authors. Many of these were prominent people working within Treasury departments in major Western powers who had schemes of their own to get the economy moving again. It also carried some work by market socialists who claimed that marginalist equilibrium economics was to be the true functional economics of advanced socialism (an historical point of interest often forgotten in contemporary left-wing critiques of marginalist economics!). By the mid-1930s, however, the periodical had been hijacked by mainstream thinkers from banks who advocated austerity together with newly emerging public relations men like Sigmund Freud’s nephew Edward Bernays.

Funnily enough, the question as to what constituted an economist at this moment in history was slippery at best. Dimand notes that Keynes had a degree in mathematics, Kahn in mathematics and physics and Harrod in the classics. It was not until after WWII, with the emergence of the neoclassical-synthesis, that economics began to become a truly formalised discipline.

But it is also clear that the likes of Keynes and Kahn were seen in the eyes of their peers as actual economists while people like Soddy (a Nobel Prize winner in chemistry) and Douglas (an army engineer) were seen as cranks. Again, I think that this has to do with the manner in which the two groups debated and discussed issues — as well as how they responded to actual logical errors in their doctrines.


Previous Post

Raising The Federal Funds Rate Is A Good Thing?

Next Post

Early Headlines: Trump Debts, Assets And Net Worth, 3 GOP Govs Reject AHCA, “Intweetment”, No Change For Greece, Japan Collision US Destroyer, And More

Related Posts

Bitcoin Flirts With $24K, How High Will It Go?
Economics

Bitcoin Flirts With $24K, How High Will It Go?

by John Wanguba
February 3, 2023
Venezuela's PDVSA Toughens Oil Prepayment Terms
Business

Venezuela’s PDVSA Toughens Oil Prepayment Terms

by John Wanguba
February 2, 2023
German Economy Unexpectedly Contracts In Q4, Renewing Recession Fears
Economics

German Economy Unexpectedly Contracts In Q4, Renewing Recession Fears

by John Wanguba
February 2, 2023
Judge Dismisses Proposed Class-Action Suit Claiming Coinbase Securities Sales
Business

Judge Dismisses Proposed Class-Action Suit Claiming Coinbase Securities Sales

by John Wanguba
February 2, 2023
Aesop Targeted In $2bn Bidding War Between French Groups
Business

Aesop Targeted In $2bn Bidding War Between French Groups

by John Wanguba
February 1, 2023
Next Post

Early Headlines: Trump Debts, Assets And Net Worth, 3 GOP Govs Reject AHCA, "Intweetment", No Change For Greece, Japan Collision US Destroyer, And More

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Browse by Category

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized

Browse by Tags

adoption altcoins banking banks Binance Bitcoin Bitcoin adoption Bitcoin market Bitcoin mining blockchain BTC business China crypto crypto adoption cryptocurrency crypto exchange crypto market crypto regulation decentralized finance DeFi Elon Musk ETH Ethereum Europe finance FTX inflation investment market analysis markets Metaverse mining NFT nonfungible tokens oil market price analysis recession regulation Russia technology Tesla the UK the US Twitter

Archives

  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • August 2010
  • August 2009

Categories

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized
Global Economic Intersection

After nearly 11 years of 24/7/365 operation, Global Economic Intersection co-founders Steven Hansen and John Lounsbury are retiring. The new owner, a global media company in London, is in the process of completing the set-up of Global Economic Intersection files in their system and publishing platform. The official website ownership transfer took place on 24 August.

Categories

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized

Recent Posts

  • Bitcoin Flirts With $24K, How High Will It Go?
  • Venezuela’s PDVSA Toughens Oil Prepayment Terms
  • German Economy Unexpectedly Contracts In Q4, Renewing Recession Fears

© Copyright 2021 EconIntersect - Economic news, analysis and opinion.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Contact Us
  • Bitcoin Robot
    • Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Code
    • Quantum AI
    • eKrona Cryptocurrency
    • Bitcoin Up
    • Bitcoin Prime
    • Yuan Pay Group
    • Immediate Profit
    • BitIQ
    • Bitcoin Loophole
    • Crypto Boom
    • Bitcoin Era
    • Bitcoin Treasure
    • Bitcoin Lucro
    • Bitcoin System
    • Oil Profit
    • The News Spy
    • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Trader
  • Bitcoin Reddit

© Copyright 2021 EconIntersect - Economic news, analysis and opinion.

en English
ar Arabicbg Bulgarianda Danishnl Dutchen Englishfi Finnishfr Frenchde Germanel Greekit Italianja Japaneselv Latvianno Norwegianpl Polishpt Portuguesero Romanianes Spanishsv Swedish