A semi-platonic dialogue about secular stagnation, asymmetric risks, Federal Reserve policy, and the role of model-building in guiding economic policy

Sokrates: You remember how I used to say that only active dialogue–questions-and-answers, objections-and-replies–could convey true knowledge? That a flat wax tablet covered by written words could only convey an inadequate and pale simulacrum of education?

Aristoteles: Yes. And you remember how I showed you that you were wrong? That conversation is ephemeral, and very quickly becomes too confused to be a proper educational tool? That only something like an organized and coherent lecture can teach? And only something like the textbooks compiled by my lecture notes can make that teaching durable?

Aristokles: But, my Aristoteles, you never mastered my “dialogue” form. My “dialogue” form has all the advantages of permanence and organization of your textbooks, and all the advantages of real dialectic of Sokrates’s conversation.

Sokrates: How very true, wise Aristokles!

Aristokles How am I to take that?

Xanthippe: You now very well: as snark, pure snark. That’s his specialty.

Hypatia: This is all complicated by the fact that in the age of the internet real, written, permanent dialogues can spring up at a moment’s notice:

Sokrates: And with that, let’s roll the tape:

• Larry Summers: Low Real Rates, Secular Stagnation, and the Future of Monetary Policy
• Larry Summers: Breaking New Ground on Neutral Rates
• Larry Summers: What Should the Fed Do and Have Done?
• Larry Summers: My Views and the Fed’s Views on Secular Stagnation
• Brad DeLong: Musings on the Current Episteme of the Federal Reserve…
• Paul Krugman (1999): Thinking About the Liquidity Trap
• Paul Krugman: Respectable Radicalism
• Paul Krugman (2011): The Amnesiac Economy
• Larry Summers: Thoughts on Delong and Krugman Blogs
• Paul Krugman (2013): Currency Regimes, Capital Flows, and Crises
• Olivier Blanchard et al.: Macro Effects of Capital Inflows: Capital Type Matters
• Olivier Blanchard et al.: Are Capital Inflows Expansionary or Contractionary? Theory, Policy Implications, and Some Evidence
• Brad DeLong: MOAR Musings on the Current Episteme of the Federal Reserve…: The Honest Broker for January 4, 2016
• Brad DeLong and Larry Summers (2012): Fiscal Policy in a Depressed Economy
• Paul Krugman: Rethinking Japan
• Brad DeLong: (Early) Monday DeLong Smackdown: Larry Summers on How We Know More than We Write Down in Our Lowbrow (or Highbrow) Economic Models
• Paul Krugman: Making and Using Models
• Brad DeLong: MOAR Musings on Whether We Consciously Know More or Less than What Is in Our Models…
• John Maynard Keynes (1936): The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money: The State of Long-Term Expectation
• Paul Krugman (1999): Balance Sheets, the Transfer Problem, and Financial Crises
• Larry Summers: A Postscript to Delong and Krugman
• Larry Summers: One Needs More than Attitude: One Needs a Logically-Consistent View…

Other things linked to that are highly relevant and worth reading:

• Danny Vinik: Larry Summers Gave an Amazing Speech on the Biggest Economic Problem of Our Time
• Larry Summers: At the IMF Economic Forum, Nov. 8, 2013
• Alvin Hansen (1939): Economic Progress and Declining Population Growth on JSTOR
• : Nineteenth Annual Conference of the Central Bank of Chile
• Lukasz Rachel and Thomas D Smith: Secular Drivers of the Global Real Interest Rate
• Michael Woodford (1999): Commentary: How Should Monetary Policy Be Conducted in an Era of Price Stability?
• Federal Open Market Committee: Federal Reserve Issues FOMC Statement–December 16, 2015
• Cliff Asness et al. (2010): Open Letter to Ben Bernanke

Things I did not find and place outbound links to, but should have:

• Polya
• Dennis Robertson
• Donald Patinkin

Looking at the whole thing, I wince at how lazy people–especially me–have been with their weblog post titles. I should find time to go back and retitle everything, perhaps adding an explanatory sentence to each link…