on this blog
Volumes have gone up so far, I might even be at 1% of Guido’s levels. A centi-Guido.
seriously, I am going to keep this subject going. The more I think about it, the more I realise that:
- banks need serious reform
- they do some really valuable things
- they do some really dangerous things
- the TUC and its merry men, from the best of intentions*, have found the perfect way to screw up the valuable things, leave the dangerous things less well supported, and ruin a great opportunity to make things better.
Sometimes, just because the people from the Adam Smith Institute believe something, it doesn’t mean its wrong. Sometimes.
I think Nick Rowe, that wonderful Canadian, has hit on a similar problem in this post. Tax analysis is about both efficiency and justice. Some people, though, seem so obsessed with the justice angle that they remain determined to shoe-horn the efficiency side into agreeing with their views. This is particularly egregious when even the justice side of things is misconceived; your tax isn’t only inefficient for the economy, it doesnt even hit the people you think it’s hitting ….
*well, it surely can’t be for reasons of envy or low populism, surely…
Posted by Rebuttal yawn « Though Cowards Flinch on February 18, 2010 at 10:54 am
[...] loads of dead interesting stuff to write about, honest, not least an open-minded response to the increasingly well-read Giles on his colleague’s no-doubt utterly parameterized bollox on wage bargaining, if he ever gets [...]
Posted by Paul Sagar on February 18, 2010 at 1:04 pm
I’m getting stats envy.
Now I need to buy a big fast car to compensate.
Posted by Paul Sagar on February 18, 2010 at 1:12 pm
Although I am pootling along at an averge of 235 hits a day at present, and am getting more 300+ days than ever.
Modest, but respectable I feel. We can’t all be picking fights with Guido and giving technical summaries of Robin Hood whatsits, I suppose.
Posted by freethinkingeconomist on February 18, 2010 at 1:13 pm
I wish to repudiate a lifetime of modesty. It sucks. Here goes for populism.
Getting linked to by Tim is of course a massive bonus.
Posted by leftoutside on February 19, 2010 at 12:36 am
Hannan linked to me once, he’s a surprisingly big readership for someone so wrong.
I agree with Paul below, your readership is only going to go up.
But… check this out if we’re comparing willies… linked to by wikipedia. Now I’m misinforming people on a scale I never thought possible.
Posted by freethinkingeconomist on February 19, 2010 at 12:58 pm
I had never thought of the wiki way of getting traffic … good idea
Posted by Paul on February 18, 2010 at 6:01 pm
I think you’re both going really well and will, I imagine both be up around the 600-800 hits a day within 3 months. Remember I told you. I get the sense that high quality blogging is starting to get its reward and that blog reader tastes are moving away from the tittle tattle, alongside a MSM/blog convergence of sorts. You’ve both put yourselves in the right place at just the right time as far as growing readership goes, though of course there is still the question of what it’s all for beyond the very pleasure of that (and I’m not against that as an end in itself, necessarily).
Posted by freethinkingeconomist on February 18, 2010 at 6:21 pm
For me, it helps me think (thinking by writing) and introduces me to live topics I might not have considered; and of course it introduces me to the thoughts and thinking of others that I might not otherwise encounter. I think this is the real plus of the internet- enforced interaction across political boundaries. Let’s face it – without the Internet, 20 years ago, in which forum would you, Paul, Tim and Richard have argued?
Blogs render universities redundant: discuss
(ducks)
up to 880 now…
Posted by leftoutside on February 19, 2010 at 12:39 am
Getting rid of Universities would be fantastic from an educational point of view in a way, so long as they were replaced by a genuinely continual and life long system of learning. It’d be more healthy and open to all in society, not just those that decide to shortly after leaving school with the means to study.
But it was sooooo much fun, and if someone said that it was no longer going to exist I’d be incredibly sad. Suppose its partly nostalgia that’s made me apply for that masters…
Posted by Paul on February 18, 2010 at 6:54 pm
Re: blogs replacing universities, I know I may be prone to a halcyon view of what universities are and might be about, but I actually think you’re not entirely wrong to suggest something along those lines. Both the information availability and ‘to and fro’ potential is now such that I do wonder whether the ‘teach and they will learn’ method, with all the cost that it entails, might at least in part be replaced by the cut and thrust of blog style debate to create an environment closer to the (admittedly idealized) mediaeval university where there were no teachers, only scholars. Of course the whole physicality of university – moving away from mum and dad, hanging out with mates at odd times of day, all the rest – can’t be replaced by bloggery, and should I think be retained even over and above teacher/student ratio’s if it’s a question of options analysis, but simply in terms of learning methods I do wonder as I ride through Edge Hill University campus on my way to Ormskirk for work and see ther traditional lecture halls in the business school (through very modern perspex) and students not completely hanging on every word.
Posted by freethinkingeconomist on February 18, 2010 at 9:58 pm
Not time to expand on this but: I think Uni ends up being really a time to take a break from economic reality, and meet thousands of people of your own type and age. The learning – well, I learn quicker nowadays, everything makes much more sense in the light of experience.
At the LSE 3 years ago it really made me cross to see students failing to attend classes and lectures and then complaining about the cost. But I suppose they were doing what they needed to do – just hang out. The learning will come later. But this is partly why I think it is fair it should be paid for, but long after.
Posted by Nick Rowe on February 19, 2010 at 1:08 am
Giles: Thanks! I would love to take the credit, but that post was by my co-blogger, Stephen Gordon!
Posted by freethinkingeconomist on February 19, 2010 at 8:19 am
Aaah. Well I still think the blog is a marvellous education, whoever is writing. It deserves another title; David Herle explained to a UK audience what that phrase means in Canada, most unfair….