THE ECONOMY'S NEW CLOTHES: Milton Friedman on the New Economy
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- čas přidán 26. 05. 2024
- This interview was filmed on March 10, 2000. Internet technologies are transforming the way we communicate and do business. But, are we, as some claim, in the midst of the "long boom," a new era of unparalleled prosperity driven by unprecedented technological change or are we merely enjoying a bull market that has yet to begin its inevitable correction? What does the current economic boom have in common with the "Roaring Twenties" and how can we avoid an economic contraction as severe as the Great Depression?
The biggest shock about this whole video is only 125,000 views in 12 years.
Peter Robinson is such a classy dude, great interviewer, very rare today.
colloredbrothers he's great. I love his diction.
Both men are very rare today. Now we have people pampered in the unreality of Socialist economics.
This man was a freaking prophet.
Its really impressive that he could explain any economical issue in such a simple way. His charisma and sense of humour are worth appreciation.
Only fifteen years ago, yet it's like a totally different world today. Amazing how bad things have gotten since that time and how much the culture has changed for the worse.
+cerebral23 It's the false perception that things only get "better" as time progresses. Also, the youth have experienced no other time period, so have nothing to compare today to. History is highly manipulated and, in the States, is fixated on racial/gender issues (social history of egalitarian movements). This leads many kids to see the past merely as a "dark age" of inequality.
I think it is pretty obvious why the youth would view the inequality of our past as dark. You don't need to have been there to realize that slavery, segregation, gender inequality, as you cited, are an embarrassment. I think it is reasonable to state things are still "getting better" for the youth. As technology advances and society becomes more inclusive, we do have better access and freedom to things you did not before. We can now access information in seconds that can direct us to the nearest recreational area if we think that our utility would be maximized by doing so. We can partake in most all of the activities that you have had available your whole life. Not only that, but we can be gay, straight, black, white and have a far higher inclusion of access to everything. There is greater access to food, water, health services, etc. So on the microeconomic level that I think you were suggesting, we now have greater access to utility maximizing activities (some that we didn't and would never have known existed without the progression we have seen) and can therefore participate more frequently as well. There is more capability to pursue one's self interests
I wonder what Milton would think of the depression of 2008. He was a master thinker
Whenever someone says to you "this is not a bubble, this is a new economy with a completely new set of rules" be very, very skeptic...
yared94 skeptical*
What a treat to watch this. He has always been a great interviewer
@HooverInstitution was this actually filmed on the exact day of the NASDAQ peak, March 10, 2000?
According to Friedman, given that you have a central bank, the federal reserve can minimizing harm by increasing the supply of money by the same measure of an increase in productive output per year. The Twenties saw a dramatic increase in productive output, hence the monetary expansion, which, yes, contributed. He argues that given we have a central bank, the supply of money should not be allowed to contract by one third, this being the prime cause of the Great Contraction. He prefers abolition
What he means by that statement is a little bit more nuanced than I think you are giving him credit for. Even most Austrian economists would say that it takes until after a bubble pops before you know FOR SURE it was a bubble. An economy is an incredibly complex thing.
"I want to replace the FED with a computer" enter bitcoin
Better yet, replace the fed with nature --- gold and silver.
Nope. We had gold and silver. It was too cumbersome too work without the "trusted" 3rd party of the government or fed (they really are the same even if in name different). It still is. And the 3rd party turned out to be not trustworthy. And it will not be in the future. Bitcoin fixes this by having no need for the 3rd party. So in this way the nature will not infact be better.
Tenebrousable Bitcoin cannot be printed in a case of deflation, it's useless as a currency.
SauberC10
It doesn't really matter one way or the other, if the deflation argument is right or wrong. Because If there is two currencies to choose from, and another is guaranteed to lose value (like ALL government fiat currenies are), and the other one is not, people will start to buy in to the one that does not have that guarantee regarless the intellectual arguments, eventually. It sucks to take out loans in that currency. Well we'll still have the fiat for that. If you are so worried about that and are convinced it's good.
Deflation being harmfull is fiction and speculation by the treasonous Keynes, in my humble opinion. It has not been demonstrated. Government is the biggest debt taker in any economy. Deflation kills the spending ability of the government. This reduces the power of the elected officials, and they can't have that. So they start printing. Everything bad that happens when deflation is near, is the result of out of controll money printing in attempt to fight it. Because, when people see the value of their money going down, they start saving even more and stop buying things. That's what kills the economies like Japan.
When the purchasing power of the money in my pocket goes up, I afford to buy more, not less, and so I will. So will you and everyone else. Deflation propaganda is designed to protect government power. Atleast, that's my argument.
We should buy houses when we can afford them, not in the hopes the value will go up. My car doesn't appreciate, that investment goes down like a stone, still I'll buy a new one when I need it, not because I'm afraid of inflation. Same with all electronics. Electronics sales alone should prove the deflation argument to be a hoax.
Tenebrousable,
Precious metals weren't out-competed by fiat, they were made illegal to use as money by government. Attempts to bring it back has been made (look up "Liberty Dollar") but were shut down by the feds. I suggest picking up Rothbard's book "What Has Government Done to Our Money?" if you want to know why precious metals stopped being used. It's free both as a PDF and audio book at the Mises Institute's website.
In a free market scenario I have no idea whether precious metals, cypto, something entirely different (or a combination of several of them) would be used as money. In any case I would prefer to see the market figure this out, instead of bureaucrats.
"What Has Government Done to Our Money?": mises.org/library/what-has-government-done-our-money
Great stuff, Peter, and the new intro is really terrific.
Called it!
Well, there is truth to that. Like they say good and bad times are only recognized when it has past.
8:00 bitcoin!?
literally thought same thing
He also could have meant that a computer/advanced AI program would do the job of the Fed better than its human counterparts could possibly do, to prevent the sort of mismanagement its been responsible for in the past.
That said, we could consider going to a "Bitcoin Standard," much like we had the Gold Standard
I keep thinking "there must be a fundamental reason why everyone ignores austrian economics which makes perfect sense", but I have yet to find anything close.
"You only recognize a bubble after the event not before" Hmm some Austrian Economists would disagree.
He also said that he is in favor of aboloshing the FED all together, approximately 5 seconds later.
26:00
Meanwhile 8 years later...
LEGEND
Didn't quite turn out like that, did it? Milton's one flaw was that he was overly optimistic about how intelligently people act.
Revisited Feb 1 2021
8:17 West Virginians know this isn’t true. There’s no such thing as seasons.
yes it did
This explains Greenspan's adjustable rate mortgage catastrophe.
I was in 7th grade!!
People also rate teachers,
so it's supposed to be like a sales/food job.
The Dot!
It would actually be quite interesting if Central banks could be run entirely by advanced AI programs. If the AI was advanced enough, not only could it do a better job running those banks than their human counterparts did, but It could respond appropriately to situations where other central bank directors/governors failed or mismanaged the crisis by responding too late, to harshly or incorrectly.
Well I agree with what you have said here. But I would add that although Mr Friedman was an excellent economist, I don't think he made a lot of money in the capital markets.
AAAAAND ofcourse he was wrong. ^^ 25:43
Alan Greenspan will pour money in; adopt an easy money policy, but not indefinitely.
But unfortunately he DID and that's why 2008 happened (more or less w/o the Bernanke factor)
Jalreal
Actually it was Bernanke primarily. Greenspan warned against the continuation of the policy after he left. Bernanke just didn’t listen.
and he would have been correct.
Hahaha! The dot com economy will not go the way of the model T. As a mere economics undergrad, I believe this. Economics is one thing; a herd mentality. If everyone complains and has a negative outlook, the economy will have a negative outlook. If however we are positive, and work together to PRODUCE and create wealth and prosperity, instead of speculating horrendously about the future, we will all be better off.
prescient
Haha well, it might be that he just grew bald early and it made him look older? Actually, he died just in 2006.
This is pretty damning evidence against Friedman in his later years. Why he tought Greenspan knew what he did I can't imagine. Why he had confidence Greenspan would fiddle with the interests "just a liitle to make a cushion". Yet he started a trend where that cushion has grown to be a bubble for going on 15 years with small deflation crash in assets in 2008, that just was inflated immediatly back up again.
Perhaps it was to not insult Greenspan and his position?
Look what deregulation did.
+tonyhuynhtwo It deregulated
@tonyhuynhtwo
It allowed demagogic socialists to point their fingers at the free market and create ridiculous claims such as "people blamed the poor". I have yet to see somebody actually seriously blame the poor for anything, to be honest...
This video did not age well
The Dot Com Bubble BURST 2 weeks after Peter makes this video and states at the end "Dot Com will NOT go the way of the Model T" ...there you go as he was a PROPAGANDA spiter .