I’m a bit behind on both my reading and on updating this blog, so I wanted to point to a series of fascinating articles at David Warsh’s Economic Principals blog. The first resulted from his trip to Denver for the American Economic Association meetings in early January, where he sensed a possible resurgence of interest in the history of economic ideas. This possibly rings true for those of us plodding through Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy this term.
Warsh followed up this dispatch from the AEA meetings with a most interesting piece on how the big brains of the profession are thinking about technological innovation and climate change. The piece starts with another dispatch from Denver, and traces its way back through the cold war to the RAND Corporation (and one of my heroes, Armen Alchian) and beyond. The piece touches on the contributions of Kenneth Arrow and Richard Nelson, now are both familiar names to anyone interested in the economics of innovation.
And if that’s not enough, this week’s column looks at Paul Samuelson and hedge funds, another hat tip to the history of thought that includes David Ricardo’s Waterloo. If nothing else, the blog seems to get its principals right.
I also continue to recommend Warsh’s Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations: A Story of Economic Discovery — an excellent pick for the summer reading list.