When an analyst is "shocked", is that usually a good sign? (user search)
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  When an analyst is "shocked", is that usually a good sign? (search mode)
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Question: When an analyst is "shocked", is that usually a good sign?
#1
Yes
 
#2
No
 
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Total Voters: 13

Author Topic: When an analyst is "shocked", is that usually a good sign?  (Read 2167 times)
Beet
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« on: April 09, 2012, 03:37:47 PM »

No.
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Beet
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Posts: 28,914


« Reply #1 on: April 10, 2012, 09:45:58 AM »

I mean this as more than just economically. For example, when a law professor is "shocked" about Obama's comments on judicial review. Or, a former colleague is "shocked" that the special prosecutor in Florida is skipping a grand jury. Etc. etc.

I would put "shocked" in the same category as "confused." Nominally they can either be positive or negative, and are technically neutral, but in practice, "confused" often means "boneheaded, but can't say that on the record" and "shocked" means the same thing. I mean, if your best friend was arrested for walking down the street with his private parts sticking out and a reporter asked you about it, what would you say? You were "shocked."
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Beet
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« Reply #2 on: April 10, 2012, 08:55:21 PM »

No one claims they have an economic model that can produce absolute accuracy.
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Beet
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« Reply #3 on: April 10, 2012, 09:01:50 PM »
« Edited: April 10, 2012, 09:08:21 PM by Beet »

No one claims they have an economic model that can produce absolute accuracy.

But plenty of people claim they have economic models that produce high levels of accuracy for years or even decades on end, which would have you laughed out of the room at a meteorological conference.

All economic models are estimates. If anyone claims that their economic model takes into account all possible factors, and that adherence to it is equivalent to a sort of natural law, then they deserve to be laughed at. But most economic models are simply best-guesses based on some selected variables deemed to be the most likely to be significant.

No, you never said anything about "absolute accuracy." But that's part of the problem; terms like "any degree of certainty" (what counts as a degree of certainty? yes it's a manner of speech, but an uncertain and ambiguous one), or "accuracy" or a "high level" of something are inherently subjective. No one is denying the riskiness of the future; that is not a uniquely Austrian position.

Just the other day I was having a discussion with an Austrian about the price Apple charges for its iPhones. I pointed out that 51% of the iPad 3's cost is actually Apple profits (which judging by their $100 billion cash stockpile and recently announced dividend, they have no useful purpose for), 56% for the iPad 2, whereas only 2% was the cost of Chinese labor. I said that whether one considers that fair or not is inherently subjective, and he said yes, that is the Austrian position. As if by agreeing that price is subjective, I have binded myself to it. No, not at all. It is subjective, and in my mind, subjectively injustified, and thus pressure on Apple to raise wages is justified. But that was a different matter...
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Beet
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Posts: 28,914


« Reply #4 on: April 11, 2012, 10:29:09 AM »

Government faces the same risks and rewards as anybody else. The fact that government suffers losses (Solyndra) doesn't make it any worse than any private sector actor that occasionally suffers losses. The main difference is that economics does not allow for consideration of distributional questions, while such questions are at the center of governmental behavior.
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