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David is an occasional blogger, software engineer, Nintendo fanboy, liberal, news magazine addict, voracious TiVo user, and bibliophile. He was born in St. Louis, grew up in southern Indiana, and returned to St. Louis to attend Washington University. He hasn't managed to escape yet. He's a fan of free wine tastings, too many tv shows to name, and eating out. David makes his living developing web applications used internally by his employer. He doesn't blog about work because he's heard too many stories about that causing workplace troubles. There's more on the about page. |
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11 January 2005 - 2:38 pm
The Becker-Posner Blog is a weblog run by Gary Becker, a Nobel Prize winning economist, and Richard Posner, a federal appellate court judge with an interest in the intersection of economics and the law. The weblog is a dialog between the two with a weekly post by one of the two followed by a response from the other. I don't always agree with them as they both seem to sit (in general but not exclusively) to my right, but what really gets my goat are the comments that people leave on their posts.
I hope that Becker and Posner keep the blog going, but I would certainly sympathize if they chose to abandon it. So many of the comments are just so dumb that it must be frustrating to have intelligent analysis of complex issues ignored or denigrated by people who don't have the simplest grasp of economic issues. Here is an example:
I have to say that part of your post is hilarious. Well, OK, more than one part. First, the idea that the financial markets would produce student loans at not much more than current mortgage rates. It's more likely that the rates would be at least twice current mortgage rates. Why? Because they could. Because they have stockholders who want not simply good but great performance.
This person has failed to understand how markets work. Businesses can't simply raise their rates arbitrarily, especially on a big-ticket item like a student load. Consumers are going to shop around and take the lowest price. Too many Americans buy into a corporations are evil mindset without really understanding how things work. Here is another example:
seems that Mr. Becker has forgotten that most of those involved in the business of loans have sold their souls. He thinks that they are simply rational beings involved in market transactions that actually involve something resembling competition.
Corporations might very well be evil; it doesn't matter. As long as they aren't collaborating on price (a practice that is illegal) I can just shop around for the best price and there isn't anything they can do.
I'm not arguing here against discussion of the issues that Becker and Posner address on their blog, just that people try to restrain themselves from derailing that discussion with ridiculous messages like the ones cited above.
Posted by on 11 January 2005 at 2:38 PM
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