I enjoyed your discussion of zero sum thinking yesterday ["Them's Fighting Words" 12/29/2005] and I applaud your willingness to post dissenting views and address them directly.



I've thought about the mindset of leftist economics and I think there are two other more important distinctions between them and free market oriented thinkers.



* Static versus dynamic thinking. That is, policy decisions are analyzed purely in the context of today's variables with no concept of how changing the rules of the game might change how people play it in the future. That's why staticists ridicule the Laffer curve despite it's almost tautological obviousness to dynamists.



* Excessive association of morality to
financial/economic decisions. It's "bad" for people to be rich when others have unmet needs or wants.
People "ought" to spend their money on more morally pure things. This leads to statist policies as people
(shockingly!) inevitably fail to care for others before themselves.



I think the zero sum thinking you reference is mostly an outgrowth of their static models of the economy, but more importantly are mostly used as rhetorical devices with which to bash the morals of those who disagree with them.



Trevor Hicks

Posted by Donald L. Luskin at 1:22 PM | link   

There's more...visit the archives!