This paper surveys the monetarist position on various aspects of American monetary policy in an informal way and provides the personal reactions of a participant observer in this debate. It emphasizes the intellectual milieu in which monetarism emerged, the background factors that facilitated...

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 econornics as...

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....

Close to half the California school districts let teachers choose whether to receive their salaries ten monthly payments or in twelve. Fisherine intertemporal maximization implies that they should choose ten payments and earn interest on their savings for their summer. But about half choose...

When looked at individually there is little reason to think that economists lack integrity and are dishonest. Yet, when we look at academic papers written by economists we can see biases. This paper tries to reconcile these two observations by arguing that the constraints the profession sets on...

This essay discusses some, but by no means all the important problems that arise in econometric testing of econometric models. Specifically, it disusses the reliabilty of the underlying data and their processing, the problem of relating theories and data, ceteris paribus conditions and...

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...

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...

Monetarism is hard to define because it is not the doctrine of a school that is sharply differentiated from the rival Keynesian and new classical schools. While some ecconomists are clearly monetarists, others take intermediate positions that make it more or less arbitrary whether to call them...

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.