By Acting Man,
Mark Carney, Wrecking Ball
For reasons we cannot even begin to fathom, Mark Carney is considered a "superstar" among central bankers. Presumably, this was one of the reasons why the British government helped him to execute a well-timed exit from the Bank of Canada by hiring him to head the Bank of England (well-timed because he disappeared from Canada with its bubble economy seemingly still intact, leaving his successor to take the blame).
The adulation he receives is really a major head-scratcher. What has he ever done aside from operating the "Ctrl. Prnt." buttons? As far as we are aware, nothing. As we have discussed previously, his main legacy is that he has left Canada with one of the greatest and scariest real estate and consumer credit bubbles extant in the world today. Some accomplishment!
With respect to his economic analysis, it seems not the least bit different from the neo-Keynesian/semi-monetarist mumbo jumbo we get to hear from central bankers everywhere. This is by the way no surprise: they're an incestuous bunch and have largely received their education at the same institutions.
Most of them seem genuinely convinced that central planning not only works, but is necessary to improve on the alleged drawbacks of an "unfettered market" (i.e., the mythical unhampered free market economy no-one alive today has ever experienced). If one looks closely at what they are actually doing, it soon becomes clear that it is in principle not much different from what John Law did in France in the early 18th century (the difference is one of degree only).
No comments:
Post a Comment