• Innovations in Economic Reality, Policy and Thinking (Corrected)

    From vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.co@21:1/5 to All on Sat Sep 12 13:00:54 2020
    I had a serious transcrition error in defining th dY SDE in terms of dy instead of dI. It seems noone even bothered to read that far.

    We are undergoing the largest Paradigm Shift (Pinkerton 1990) in half a millenium. It is about then that Copernicus penned the Quantity Theory of Money, and electronic money is changing the way stuff is measured, and maybe
    it has less friction. (Nondigital cashless currency: Sweden 1%, Euro 5%, USA 10%, USA distorted by foreigners holding cash abroad) Wenninger FRBNYQR 1987 showed M1 can't be measured. Partland FRBNYQR 1992 showed M2 can't be
    measured. So Greenspan was called "Broad Money Al" (M3) in 1993 Economist caption before turning to pegging fed funds rate. But Sargent Wallace JPE
    1975 showed pegging rates is destabilising. Further we do not know the functional relation between real or natural and nominal rates. Therefore the transformation may introduce imaginary numbers and harmonic velocity which would explain Haugen's continued high volatility during the Great Depression (ie, it was the higher order moments that were really messed up, not just the obvious lower ones - correlations all flip to one under stress and the whole thing goes and stays nuts). Once the Kagan exponential velocity goes into
    the zero range, it's trapped. And who knows what the real rate in the
    exponent really is, maybe it produces harmonics. So if we go back to Sargent Wallace 1975 saying pegging rates is destabilising, I think there is a window when they aren't, between 2% and 6%. Above it becomes a strange detractor of hyperinflation. Below it goes into the strange attractor of liquidity trap or secular stagnation (ZIRP and negative rates concealed as exorbitant bank
    fees). (Mundell, Monetary Theory, 1971, pp. 66-73, esp fig 7-1) So therefore
    I would never allow rates out of the 2-6 window, instead use things like QE (13-3;Joseph & Pharoah were the original RFC/RTC/TARP) below. But beware Plossser prefers slight deflation. I kinda think of this as
    neo-neo-classical, trying to meld liquidity trap with rat expectations and Mundell's stability analysis. Recently I have heard anecdotal evidence Velocity can't be measured. And how did we measure Y (GDP) before Keyenes, anyway? Perhaps a separation of variables is needed, maybe find a way to
    tease out population from income (GDP/capita times population), maybe treat supply times velocity (MV) as a single quantity. The Taylor rule is but the logarithmic derivative (elasticity) of the Quantity Theory constrained by the FRA 1913 requirement of elastic currency. I have been experimenting with Cornell Eureqa with which I got Y= 8.6E10 + 1.4 C - .13 (I*C) and and SDE d
    (ln (y)) = (5/7) sin (d ln (m2)) to combine with dy= (2/5) I + (13/3) dI, an SDE from the Klein model. I would like to use Feynman Kac to turn this into a PDE, perhaps Continuum Field Economics. In the mid90s, about when Fourth Turning came out, Greenspan began worrying about deflation and brought in Ben Bernancke who worked with Vincent Reinhart (AER 2004) developed ZIRP/QE in
    case we become like Japan: GM, A&P and Greece all went bankrupt because of pensions (abortion); Bear Stearns went broke the day the first boomer
    retired. I think politicians have too fixed, dogmatic a view of econ, like stopped clocks, right only twice a day. The right is always fighting
    inflation, the left is always fighting deflation.

    Electronic money (bitcoin, etherium, &c) is the future universal
    currency. Those who argue gold is the opposite of fiat money forget someone
    has to peg gold, which makes it fiat, too. A quarter century at NYC's
    Harvard Club, I got Andy Spindler to concur that moving regulation to the Treasury OCC would eliminate the conflict of interest that inspires
    conspiracy theories. The OCC has its roots in the 1792 Controller of the Treaury, which included Call Reports from the beginning but evolved into the OCC by the time Lincoln renamed it. While I do not think an absolute gold standard is what it is claimed to be, I do support a universal currency, a la Bretton Woods. Further I do believe the Fed Reserve should look at gold and petroleum prices. In exchange for moving all bank, securities and insurance regulation to the OCC, I would give foreign exchange (as long as we don't
    have fixed exchange) and the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to the Fed Reserve. Osama wanted to break us with $144 oil and almost did in 2008, and this was caused in part by Dubya dropping the dollar to encourage exports, so FX
    should be part of the Fed Reserve policy envelope.

    Financial panics resemble epidemics and blackouts both in terms of contagion and interconnectedness. Like power, it is the grid which makes finance work. A quantitative rule is a lot harder to waive the way the
    Volcker Rule or Glass-Steagal can be. To appreciate the quixotic nature of
    the Volcker Rule, recall banks were first convinced to sell securities by the government wishing to sell its own bonds a century ago. In 1902 OCC banned banks selling corporate securities but chose not to block National City from using a subsidiary in 1911, then in WW1 encouraged banks to sell government bonds. (Broome& Markham 2001 p731& 747) Enron masked phantom profits by claiming to reinvest them instead of paying dividends. In 2008 mortgage risk was masked from Basel ratios by stripping. THis suggests that Basel can only be effective if part of the reserve capital is placed with the Fed. But at
    the same time, deposit insurance also creates a moral hazard by promising to rescue bad behavior. Instead of a waivable binary Volcker Rule, they should use a Taylor-like Rule that changes Basel Capital Ratios with leverage
    squared, volatility and inversely GNP (the SDE is (L-1) dr + L d var - d ln
    y) I would use Basel ratios across the board on banking, finance, insurance, and make them hold it as interest-bearing excess reserves at FRB to avoid phantoms (like pre-Hubbard-dividend retained earns). Capital ratios are self-insurance, hence lack the moral hazard of deposit insurance.

    Social savings accounts should replace entitlements (retirement, health, education, housing). As Enron, Bear Stearns, GM and Chrysler pensions vanished, these should be jointly monitored by individual, employer and government. As major transactions are delayable and deliberate and tax assessors never mark to market, it is better to use indifference prices than marking to market. When an individual has fulifilled obligations to social savings, may be considered "accredited" investor.


    --
    Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus
    blog: panix.com/~vjp2/ruminatn.htm - = - web: panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
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