Wednesday, January 18, 2012

On Keynes and Hayek: Macroeconomics is Geographical rather than Political

Both the traditional Kenyesian and Hayekian macroeconomic policies are no longer effective in this current world where the systemic risk in the global market is high. Unless it stimulates all countries' economy simultaneously, Keynesian stimulus package does not work. Unless there is an extremely universal consensus, Hayekian structural reform does not work. The universal government is less likely to be wanted so that both policies won't be accepted. Nowadays, the world economy seems to be turning back to focus on more Microeconomics like in the past. We are no longer able to expect the aggregate level to be either up or stabilised. Each economic agent now has to rely on his/her own risk management analysis, which is a microeconomic subject, in order to survive in this unpredictable macroeconomic environment.....



I admire Keynes himself because he accused Ricardo's theories for his misunderstanding of how the real world economy actually functions. Keynes was successful to offer the theories which are more correlated to the real world situation unlike Ricardo's ones. His critical analyses about the aspect that all classical economists ignored are very clear and sophisticated.

However, Keynes' fault is that he did not clearly mention "how exactly and effectively" pour their stimulus money into economy. This was the crucially weak characteristics of Keynesian theory.

I don't see Hayek as an economist; He is more likely a political economist / political philosopher.

I strongly argue that macroeconomics is more geographical rather than political i.e. passive than positive



Speaking of Monetary Economy, both Keynes and Hayek do not answer fully about how individual economic agents respond to the interest rate. The central bank's interest rate is (as long as it is operated rationally without any politicised ideological bias) merely determined to adjust the real interest rate to be zero as much as possible. If it is deviated from zero, it of course negatively affects macroeconomic environment. But, it does not mean the zero rate stimulate economy: The stimulus is very different from the central bank's interest rate.

Neither the animal spirit nor the long term expectation is fallacy. The right answer to describe the investment motive in the monetary economy is "There is nothing to specify a factor that stimulates in the macroeconomic level"! There is even a possibility that in a chaotic depression, the investment motive dramatically increases because of the possibility to win the gamble! Furthermore, in the economic boom, the interest rate tends to be "lowered" because the "risk of bankruptcy" of borrowers goes down.

This does not mean irrational; This is actually a very rational acts by economic agents because they act owing to their own surrounding environment, information obtained from their own sources, and psychological preference. Thus, Keynes' animal spirit fails. In addition, these economic agents do not too much care about the structural issues so much.

They decide their investment plan by means of the "form of contract" with their clients, rather than the structure of the borrowers' business. The contract differs across different types of borrowers. So, as long as the contract ensures to bring some business gain, investors are quite happy to lend money to mal-structured businesses. Thus, Hayek's focus on the long term structural issues fails.