Eine Appell zur Reform der Öko­no­mie, getra­gen von einer keyne­sia­nisch-insti­tu­tio­na­lis­ti­schen Allianz:

„Dear Col­league

The web plea/​petition in sup­port of the words below by Paul Krug­man now has over 1300 signa­tures, the majo­ri­ty of which are qua­li­fied aca­de­mics. Thank you to ever­yo­ne who has given their support.

But only 3% of the signa­to­ries are under­gra­dua­te stu­dents. Plea­se ask your stu­dents if they sup­port this state­ment. (You may remind ever­yo­ne that signing is free, and they can lea­ve the web­site befo­re making a donation.)

„Few eco­no­mists saw our cur­rent cri­sis com­ing, but this pre­dic­ti­ve fail­u­re was the least of the field’s pro­blems. More important was the profession’s blind­ness to the very pos­si­bi­li­ty of cata­stro­phic fail­u­res in a mar­ket eco­no­my … the eco­no­mics pro­fes­si­on went astray becau­se eco­no­mists, as a group, mis­took beau­ty, clad in impres­si­ve-loo­king mathe­ma­tics, for truth … eco­no­mists fell back in love with the old, idea­li­zed visi­on of an eco­no­my in which ratio­nal indi­vi­du­als inter­act in per­fect mar­kets, this time gus­sied up with fan­cy equa­tions … Unfor­tu­n­a­te­ly, this roman­ti­ci­zed and saniti­zed visi­on of the eco­no­my led most eco­no­mists to igno­re all the things that can go wrong. They tur­ned a blind eye to the limi­ta­ti­ons of human ratio­na­li­ty that often lead to bub­bles and busts; to the pro­blems of insti­tu­ti­ons that run amok; to the imper­fec­tions of mar­kets – espe­cial­ly finan­cial mar­kets – that can cau­se the economy’s ope­ra­ting sys­tem to under­go sud­den, unpre­dic­ta­ble cras­hes; and to the dan­gers crea­ted when regu­la­tors don’t belie­ve in regu­la­ti­on. … When it comes to the all-too-human pro­blem of reces­si­ons and depres­si­ons, eco­no­mists need to aban­don the neat but wrong solu­ti­on of assuming that ever­yo­ne is ratio­nal and mar­kets work per­fect­ly.“ (New York Times, Sep­tem­ber 2nd, 2009.)

SIGN „Revi­ta­li­zing Eco­no­mics After the Crash“ 

I think this is an important oppor­tu­ni­ty to make an impact – and help to chan­ge eco­no­mics for the bet­ter. Pro­gress on the peti­ti­on will be announ­ced to the inter­na­tio­nal press in October.

Best wis­hes
Geoff Hodg­son“