Re: Leftists knocking Friedman ?

On Feb 19, 12:08=A0pm, stuff_st...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:
> On Tue, 19 Feb 2008 09:27:07 -0800 (PST), Lysander
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> <lysan...@[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
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> >> 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/20=
07/images/el0712c4.gif
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> >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.
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> >http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/BusinessCycles.html
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> This has nothing to do with party in power, etc. . It's unrelated.
> You're throwing up random cites essentially.
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I never said anything about what party was in power in this post.
Simply that the business cycle is NOT flatter in the post war period.

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> >"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.
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> 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.
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You assert. Romer never looked at that question. Read carefully on an
adult level. The business cycle has not gotten flatter in the post war
period as you claim.

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

Perhaps you should read the entire quotation and in the context of
what it is responding to. Perhaps you should understand Friedman's
arguments before jumping into a thread about Friedman and wanting to
argue democrats versus Republicans. Such partisan****p has no place in
science.