This paper reviews and appraises the debate about whether the central bank should pursue counter-cyclical policy or generate a stable monetary growth rate. It focuses on whether the participants have followed the rules of "good conversation," and concludes that they have not. Monetarist have...

The principle that theories should be tested by the accuracy of their predictions but not by the realism of their assumptions needs to be qualified. As a practical matter we often need to evaluate the applicability of theories to cases for which they have not been tested by their predictions....

Before condemning data mining one should distinguish between objective and biased data mining. The former is commendable. Even biased data mining is appropriate when used to illustrate and not to test hypotheses. In the context of testing, the problem with biased data mining arises not from the...

Many of Boettke's criticisms of formalist economics are justified. However, he defines it so broadly that it becomes practically synonymous with mainstream economics. Yet he blames it for the specific sins of formalist economics more narrowly defined. And since he treats Austrian economics as...

Why was the Fed so inflationary in 1965-79? No single explanation suffices. Forecast errors and poor operating procedures played at most a minor role. Unwillingness to accept greater interest-rate variation and cognitive errors played a greater role. Political pressures also played a role, but,...

How can one tell whether academic research influences macroeconomic policy? One possibility is to look at government documents that set forth macro policy. This paper looks for such traces in U.S., European and Japanese documents. Because of ease of access it focuses on U.S. documents. Numerous...

The widespread belief that monetarism has failed is open to question. Certain strong monetarist positions have been damaged by unfolding events, but more moderate propositions live on in current "Keynesian" consensus.

Economists do not communicate efficiently and methodologists<p> should expand their bailiwick to deal with this and with similar<p> practical problems. Both the quality of and the professional<p> prestige associated with popular writing should be enhanced. Aca-<p> demic economists need to pay more attention...</p></p></p></p>