Thursday, September 10, 2009

Do Central Banks and Independent Economists Mix?

“How the Federal Reserve Bought the Economic Profession” is an honest and precise analysis of how the Federal Reserve dominates the field of economics and stifles real criticism, in The Huffington Report here .

Things are even worse on this side of the Atlantic since criticisms of the European Central Bank (other than on technical niceties) amount to zilch, and the bank controls the profession through employment of economists, research grants, and gate keeping of journals and publications by affiliates, helped in this task by national central banks (Yes, they still exist despite monetary integration!). Hence the dominance of monetary macroeconomics, and the overall approval of the euro by European economists, even when they voice some superficial doubts, only to better refute real and fundamental criticism.

But it would be fair to add that central banks, in turn, are extremely dependent on financial big businesses.

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