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Matthew Yglesias thinks the "Cult of Price Stability" is to blame | 343 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Krugman column - not NY Times
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 10 2012 @ 02:06 PM EST
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/12/10-1

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

We will need less labor -- Fact
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 10 2012 @ 09:51 PM EST
We will need less labor in the world of the future to produce the same goods and
services. This means that if we have a constant supply of labor, the price of
labor (wages) will fall.

Fortunately it appears to me now that the developed world population has already
peaked and is slowly falling and that the developing world as it becomes
developed will also slowly fall in population. This hopefully will mean that
the fewer children that we are having as they grow up into adults will still
have jobs that pay for both basic necessities and also an enjoyable life.

The problem with the rosy hope is that such dislocations will not be gradual and
without pain, but rather there will be large segments of the population who do
not have enough economic value as workers to make a "decent living".
This problem is certainly more acute in places like sub-Saharan Africa where the
average Niger woman has 7 kids, and her polygamist spouse has maybe 20.
Unfortunately there is not enough land for the relatively rich farmer father to
divide amoung his 10 sons, so they will be below subsistence. This is the
ultimate irony -- a wealthy father condemning his progeny to starvation.
Hopefully education in this and the next generation can stop this cycle, but the
stopping of it will be painful and sad. If there is anything that we can do to
make the transition less tragic, it is incumbent upon us to do so.

The world of 2050 to 2100 will look a lot different economically. I am hoping
that the values of education and the European Enlightenment where the natural
laws of fairness prevail over blind medieval mysticism will survive this
transition. I am ever so fearful for the disillusioned youth of the Arab spring
whose payback for their education is no jobs and no future -- hence the draw
away from education for at least one generation. This is so sad to me.

Something needs to be done about it and we cannot solve the problem here on
Groklaw. A dialog on this basis at least. There are many issues and it is
impossible to cover them in detail on this blog or another simply through
comment. I hope to do something but I don't know when I can get involved fully.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Matthew Yglesias thinks the "Cult of Price Stability" is to blame
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, December 11 2012 @ 12:56 PM EST
The declining labor share of national income isn't the result of mysterious technological forces; it's the result of policy choices, specifically macroeconomic stabilization policies. Specifically the idea that the thing that macroeconomic policy ought to stabilize isn't output or employment but inflation—which is to say wages.

[..]

A Fed that sometimes allows for recessions and prolonged periods of high unemployment but never allows for inflation is creating a situation in which the wage share of the economy must fall over time.

Matthew Yglesias, Slate

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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