Wednesday 17 December 2008

Hands Together, Eyes Closed


Let us pray
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6 comments:

Sackerson said...

For what, to whom?

17 December 2008 at 20:24
hatfield girl said...

Precisely, S. Sterling 1.07 and falling. Unemployment over a million (not counting the permanent and long term workless). New Labour lying in its teeth (there's a surprise) about keynesian stimulus when they have done no more than the rest of Europe, which apart from Spain, amounts to next to nothing.

(Puts head back in hands).

17 December 2008 at 20:36
Sackerson said...

If this is a rerun of the 1966-1982 bear market, then we are currently at 1974. See any points of similarity?

18 December 2008 at 05:41
hatfield girl said...

S, you ask a Reddaway-type question and I claim sanctuary on the grounds of never ever taking another examination.

'Reddaway was successful in the early 1960s in introducing a compulsory paper in economics and social statistics for most
second year students. This was however rather different from statistical papers in other universities. It did not teach much statistical technique, but
emphasized empirical analysis of economic issues; particular attention was given to national income accounting and to the balance of payments identities
and statistics. Effectively, it was a paper in applied economics which had seemingly simple questions, but which would even today test PhD students in economics at most universities. Reddaway’s questions were carefully crafted to test the student’s ability to use real-world data to illuminate economic issues.

These questions, which came to be known as ‘Reddaway-type’ questions,
were very important to the teaching of economics in Cambridge. ... He set the following typical question in the 1964
examination.

You are employed by a business tycoon of uncertain politics, who got a II.1 in economics, but did not take the statistics paper. You find that he has gone away for the afternoon leaving the following note:

‘I spent yesterday evening between two old College friends, T.Ory
and L.Abour. Ory was trying to convince me that the economic
record for 1959-63 reflected great credit on the government, because
there had been good rises in all the following real terms:
(a) The total production of goods and services.
(b) Output per head in manufacturing
© Foreign trade
(d) Capital formation
(e) Personal consumption, both in total and per head of
population
Moreover he insisted that there were other favourable features, such as:
(i) Unemployment has been negligible
(ii) The growth in the quantity of money had been no greater than was justified by the rise in production
(iii) The rise in prices had slowed down to an easily tolerable pace.
(iv) The balance of payments had on the whole been favourable.
(v) The international position of the pound had been strengthened.

On the other hand Abour maintained that in a progressive economy it
was natural to have rises in all the items in Ory’s list, and the real feature of the period was their smallness. As for his other points, Abour’s rejoinder was as follows:

1. Unemployment had been rising throughout the period.
2. The movements in the quantity of money were, as such, of no real importance.
3.The rise in prices had been far from negligible, and had been kept down largely by the stability of import prices, for which even a Tory government could hardly claim
the credit.
4.By the relevant tests, the balance of payments had been
unfavourable, and indeed the Government had used its bad state as an argument for keeping down wages.
5.We ended the period with less reserves than the start, and greater liabilities.’

Please get out the statistics which you consider relevant for judging the truth of the above matters, prepare tables and/or graphs in such a way that I can draw conclusions from them, and write notes on what your own conclusions
are, indicating any places where these are of a subjective character.
(emphasis in original)

The students were provided with the National Income Blue Book and another government source book, Economic Trends. This was essentially the whole examination, to be completed within three hours.'

18 December 2008 at 07:59
Sackerson said...

Clearly you're far fitter to answer it than I am, and I probably wouldn't understand your answer. In layman's terms and in a nutshell, don't you think we're a bit like 1974 - inflation on the way, industry in crisis etc?

18 December 2008 at 08:12
Anonymous said...

Brian was exemplary; unique unfortunately.

Not quite the same as 1974, S.
In 1974 oil price quadrupled, in 2008 it fell to almost one fourth of its recent peak.
Then and now, what is being devalued is "the pound in your pocket", though.

18 December 2008 at 08:33

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