Sorry, but we are not all “Keynesians.”

It is a well-known quote commenting economic policies:”We are all Keynesians right now.” It is true, at least in political arena, and even for free-market economists becoming careered politicians. Stimulus plans, aimed to substitute the lost purchasing power due to the financial crisis, are setup just within such a short time and are so roughly [...]

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China should be spending like a Keynesian.

Throughout the post second world war period, America’s economy played the role of a shock absorber to the global economy by being the spender of the last resort. Now, with the government and private American in debt, it is up to the savers of foreign currency reserve to spend. (i put China in the [...]

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The Keynesian Proposition

Over at Economist.com, they got Brad DeLong and Luigi Zingales representing Keynesianism and Neoclassical respectively over an online debate on the proposition “We are all Keynesians now.”
The proposition is awkwardly framed, i mean come’on, arguing for the proposition is like arguing that entire political and economic elites agrees over the remedy needed to recover from [...]

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ECFA與救台灣

英九先生前天正式將要跟中國簽的協議定調為「兩岸經濟合作架構協議」（Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement，ECFA），並引述中經院的報告說：如果不簽ECFA台灣會有11萬人失業。言下之意似乎是台灣與中國經濟開放，可以拯救台灣的經濟。啟銘也說「ECFA會擱發」。從總統大選時，英九便不斷宣稱與中國開放可以拯救台灣經濟，可是從520至今，一連串的開放政策似乎並未未達到英九和兆玄宣稱的效果，從經濟學人、CNN和紐約時報都爭相報導台灣經濟遭受這波金融海嘯衝擊為世界第一，便可知。問題究竟出在哪裡呢？

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如何評量消費券的效果？

看到最近沸沸揚揚的消費券議題, 從之前就想要寫些什麼討論一下這個公共政策, 但無論是在意識型態咖啡, 異鄉人或是 Evil Capitalist Heroes 都有淺白但是深刻的討論, 如果再多寫什麼, 都有班門弄斧的嫌疑, 只是手癢的時候還是停不住, 由於消費券政策的『勢在必行』, 不妨來討論一下, 怎麼樣衡量消費券的效果。

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消費券與玉米片

看最近的新聞莫名地想起一則小故事，出處應該是「生命中的經濟遊戲」，內容大概是這樣的：

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難以接受的真相

 
前一陣子，電視上出現許多呼籲 減稅的 廣告，聽說是工商總會砸大錢託撥的。經過公平稅改聯盟極力抵抗，最後，NCC介入停播那一系列廣告。關於減稅的話題似乎因此降溫，但最近因為政府熱烈討論降遺贈稅的問題，又重新引起民眾關注。
稅制牽扯層面相當廣泛–如：經濟發展、國際競爭力、社會福利等等–很難由單一角度評斷。更重要的是，各種稅制都是取捨，顧及公平所得分配時，常常犧牲掉經濟成長。不像健達出奇蛋能一次滿足你三個願望，稅制常常只能滿足你一個願望，而且需要學著接受兩個副作用。因此，我不打算深入地討論稅改的議題，只想從經濟學原理出發，希望只要受過基本經濟學訓練的人，都應該有能力如此看待這個議題。

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Krugman得諾貝爾獎小感

看到Paul Krugman得獎，我不自覺地想起Milton Friedman，他們同樣是傑出的經濟學家，也同時是相當活躍的公共知識份子，Krugman的文章擲地有聲，而Friedman辯才無礙。但是，他們最大的不同點在於Krugman和Friedman各站在經濟政策光譜上的兩邊。Krugman相信政府的力量，Friedman則信奉自由主義。

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The Nobel Prize in Economics 2008 goes to……

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Arguments for Legalizing Insider Trading

You may feel like saying, “Hey, you libertarians want to legalize everything!!” Unfortunately, that is the case. We try to counter-argue every unnecessary restriction and look forward to a world with the least government intervention.
This post comes from a brief discussion with neouto. We try to reinvent the wheels by restating arguments that you can easily find [...]

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