In an unusually perceptive post, Krugman complains that “again and again, people on the opposite side prove to have used bad logic, bad data, the wrong historical analogies, or all of the above.” He points out that one side of the macroeconomic debate “is, in essence, political,” driven by “hostility to any intellectual approach” that might cast doubt on its preferred p0licies.

Bill McNabb, CEO of the Vanguard Group, in today’s WSJ op ed Uncertainty Is the Enemy of Recovery discusses Vanguard’s estimate that policy uncertainty has created a $261 billion drag on the U.S. economy.

While it is good to see policy uncertainty highlighted, the more relevant concept is Robert Higgs’s regime uncertainty as discussed in these Mises Dailies and Circle Bastiat posts:

William Butos was awarded the 2013 O.P. Alford III Prize for his paper Monetary Orders and Institutions: A Hayekian Perspective. The prize is given to the author of the paper that best advances libertarian scholarship.

Imagine a country that has a corrupt authoritarian government. In that country no one knows about checks and balances or an independent court system. Private property is not recognized in that country either. Neither can one buy or sell land. And businesses are reluctant to bring investments into this country. Those who have jobs usually work for the public sector. Those who don’t have jobs subsist on entitlements that provide basic food. At the same time, this country sports a free health care system and free access to education. Can you guess what country it is?

Thomas DiLorenzo will be teaching Lincoln: The Founding Father of the American Leviathan, starting May 9.

Economic Policy Journal’s takeaway on the Reinhart-Rogoff fiasco:

Austrian economics reject empirical data as a method to prove economic theory, for Austrians it is all about logical deductions. Thus, there is not much for Austrians to do, relative to the current Reinhart-Rogoff destruction at the hands of a U Mass graduate student, other than to grab some popcorn and watch with bemusement from the sidelines.

The gold standard was an international standard. It safeguarded the stability of foreign exchange rates. It was a corollary of free trade and of the international division of labor. Therefore those who favored etatism and radical protectionism disparaged it and advocated its abolition. Their campaign was successful.

In a comment on Reynolds and Cochran on the Slow Recovery, Marcus Nunes argued, “If there was a lesson in the R&R fracas is that you should take care with numbers, especially if you define “tipping points”. I think 15% is below what would account for the ‘core functions’ of government.” Nunes then referred the reader to ‘Keep it simple’.

For those interested in the Euro, Andreas Hoffmann (University of Leipzig), has some interesting commentary at ThinkMarkets, A blog of the NYU Colloquium on Market Institutions and Economic Processes, “The Euro: a Step Toward the Gold Standard?”