Re: Leftists knocking Friedman ?

On Tue, 19 Feb 2008 09:27:07 -0800 (PST), Lysander
<lysander@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

>On Feb 19, 11:12 am, stuff_st...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:
>> On Tue, 19 Feb 2008 09:08:33 -0800 (PST), Lysander
>
>> The data is clear. Recessions are happening less and less often, and
>> are less severe. Growth is happening for longer sustained periods with
>> short shallow
interruptions.http://www.dallasfed.org/research/eclett/2007/images/el0712c4.gif
>
>Wrong. See Christina's Romer's work. This data is not properly
>matched. GDP was measured differently in early periods. I think prior
>to the 1970's but I need to look back to her work myself. You can't
>convert the old data to the new data because the new method has things
>added that were not recorded then. However, if you convert the new
>data to the old data there is no change in the business cycle. The
>growth is not for longer periods and the interruptions are not as
>shallow if all GDP is measured in the old way. Another caveat of data.
>Make sure your measures are the same. Just because the series has the
>same name does not mean significant changes were not made in the
>measurement.
>
>http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/BusinessCycles.html

This has nothing to do with party in power, etc. . It's unrelated.
You're throwing up random cites essentially.

>
>"But appearances are deceiving. The kind of statistics that economists
>use to measure the severity of business cycles, such as data on the
>unemployment rate, real gross national product, and industrial
>production, have been kept carefully and consistently only since World
>War II. 

And that's why the author of the study did the numbers separately pre
WWII and post WWII, pre70s and post 70's. And the result is always the
same. The economy performs better under dems.

You can dance around it all you want and try to blow as much smoke as
you want. the numbers are clear.

http://www.coba.unr.edu/econ/wp/papers/UNRECONWP06008.pdf

Why don't you actually look at it before making so many lame excuses?

>Therefore, the conclusion that government policy has smoothed
>business cycles is based on a comparison of fragmentary prewar
>evidence with sophisticated postwar statistics."