On Saturday, December 22, 2001 3:08 PM Spudboy100@aol.com wrote:
> I am not sure I disagree with you, on the "reporters" contention. The
article
> was interesting because it is a challenge to the notion that
technology is an
> unalloyed good, rather then something that is neutral and requires
foresight
> in the way its applied. I don't see anything bad about that.
This is such a common sense position, I don't see why it would be
controversial -- were it not for technophobes who expect technology to
be either perfect or completely evil.
> I see technology as an absolute necessity (otherwise why I am so
obsessed by
> it?) however, technology that is foolishly applied can get things
screwed
> royale. If smart engineers, physicists, chemists, biologists,
managers,
> economists, designers; are give encouragement to ask tough questions
and get
> the job done Well, and not merely, on Thursday, then luddites will be
> disarmed.
I think the real problem with the late 1990s Boom was not so much that
people went uncritical forward with technological innovation -- but
really how technologically innovative is it to sell pet food online
below cost?:) -- but that other people were willing to disregard things
like ROI and profits to give other people money to do this. Why did
this happen? The Alan Greenspan/Paul Krugman explanation seems to be
very Keynesian: human irrationality took over. This doesn't explain
anything. Why did irrationality take over then and not sooner or later?
Instead, the answer lies in the inflationary and regulatory policies
pursued during that period. These policies setup a context in which
people would react to market signals that would lead them to have ever
more inconsistent intertemporal plans. (In other words, a properly
functioning market -- one without such distortions -- would lead to plan
coordination -- with some errors as always, since the future is always
uncertain. A distorted market inhibits this and sends investments in
the wrong direction by changing the risks and price signals.)
Happy Holidays!
Daniel Ust
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/
"The relative price effects associated with inflation affect monetary
calculation in a number of related ways. All of these problems involve
increased epistemological burdens on market actors. Because changes in
the structure of of relative prices now arise from both 'real' side
changes in preferences [i.e., what consumers really want and can demand
on the market] and opportunity costs and 'money' side changes related to
the inflation process, entrepreneurs who wish to form expectations about
future prices must account for not only the market behavior they have
always had to, but also for the effects of inflation." -- Stephen
Horwitz, _Microfoundations and Macroeconomics_, p 118
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