Almost Classical

On April 18, 2014, the city of Providence, R.I. , added to the growing list of lawsuits against exchanges, brokers, and HFT specialists. This demonstrates the power of narrative. The Lewis book,  Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt , contains nothing new, no breaking story or previously unpublished information. But, Lewis' ability to tell a story and tell it well compels politicians to respond. Remember, state attorneys general run for office; public officials remain politicians, not mere lawyers. As the media and voting public demand action, the financial industry faces growing pressures. This happened with tech stocks (how VC were taxed), the home lending industry, and now HFT. Laws pass on emotion, seldom offering good solutions to perceived problems. The lawsuits relating to HFT will culminate in regulatory changes, if not outright wins in court. http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/18/highspeed-classaction-idUSL2N0NA0XC20140418 (Reuters) - Dozens of the largest U.S. stoc...

Instead of blogging everything I read or hear, I use Twitter to promote the better content I encounter online. https://twitter.com/almostclassical Twitter seems to be the replacement for RSS feeds, sadly. I miss the old, text-centric days of newsgroups, mailing lists, and feeds. Oh, well. The market has spoken. 

The "Great Sort" at the local and state level, not the evils of redistricting, has changed our government — and, more importantly, our national discussions on all issues. And I do mean all  issues, because studies show left/right; progressive / liberal / libertarian / conservative; secular/religious; North / South / East / West; and other ways to group people correlate to music choices, television viewing, trust in government, and much more. How can we prove that redistricting isn't the villain behind our political discourse? Easily: we look at the Senate, which should represent entire states, not statistically modeled and gerrymandered districts. Yet, the Senate, supposedly the great deliberative body of our government, has become little more than yet another left-right battleground. The ideological middle is dead in Congress. Really dead. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/04/10/the-ideological-middle-is-dead-in-congress-really-dead/ BY CHRIS CIL...

As the school year began, I started to outline a basic handbook for writing within economics. That process was interrupted by life, yet I still consider the handbook a valuable endeavor for my students and for others interested in how thinkers transmit the ideas in this field. What are the rhetorical traditions within economics? How are these traditions shaped by other disciplines? How has the shift within economics from philosophy towards mathematical models ("science") altered the rhetoric of economists? How effective are the works of economists and scholars interested in economics? It seems to me, and this is not based on quantitative research, that only a few economists remain influential beyond the academic realm. Yes, there are economists advising political leaders, but how effective are they as economists — versus their effectiveness as ideologues? Helping students communicate effectively might, or might not, improve policy debates. Economists of great note wer...

Economics, as an academic discipline, remains a philosophical pursuit. This causes a "crises of identity" when students confront the notion that economics might be as much philosophy as anything else. How might I justify this claim, when contemporary econ programs in the United States have a deeply ingrained "quantitative" and "computational" identity? How can I claim there is any crisis in a field that deeply, emotionally, attaches itself to math and "scientific" methodologies? As readers know, I am an ambivalent believer in quantitative research and computational modeling. We need models, and they serve many purposes, but they are not "science" in the way most of the population now understands the label. In sciences such as quantum physics, cosmology, neuropsychology, and even climatology, disagreements are common, but there are core areas of agreement. Most sciences have a certain "Duh?" set of assumptions that suppo...

Jeremy Bentham, by Henry William Pickersgill (died 1875). See source website for additional information. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) I disagree with Peter Singer on most ethical measures, and this is no exception… Heartwarming causes are nice, but let’s give to charity with our heads - The Washington Post The notion that we can measure what is "right" using a form of ethical calculus dates back to at least Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) and the Principle of Utility. Bentham argued there are seven variables to consider when judging the "best" choice: Intensity of pleasure. Duration of pleasure. Certainty of consequences. Propinquity (proximity, nearness) of pleasure.  Fecundity (abundance) of pleasure. Purity of pleasure. Extent and scope of pleasure for others.  Singer takes things in the direction of Marx, with the needs of the (desirable and productive) many outweighing individual choice of happiness. For Singer, like the Progressives of the Wilson...

If you believe in small government (and small business), how do you defend those ideals when confronted with arguments that "government is necessary" to help those in need? (Put aside the idiotic "needs" from cell phones to high-speed Internet connections now supported by government.) Here's my answer: Do something for your community. If you don't want activist government, you need to support charitable non-governmental organizations. Unless you give time, energy, resources, and money, to various causes, then progressives are going to have a more valid argument that government is the preferred charity. My success in life is possible only because other people voluntarily helped me achieve more. The list of supporters is long, beginning, with my parents, grandparents, and extended family. My wife, my in-laws, and many friends also helped me along the way. Then there are the strangers who donated to the universities I attended, making scholarships possib...