Forbes on Economics Blogs, Mark II
Forbes has updated its story on economics blogs from March 2003 and rather kindly suggests that ‘the depth of Kirchner’s discussions…isn’t matched in many other blogs.’ However, the author of the story concludes that ‘if you don’t know the difference between demand-pull inflation and dividend imputation, this probably isn’t the blog for you.’ One of the main motivations behind this blog has been my disappointment at the dumbing-down of economics and financial market reporting in the mainstream press. There seems to be a working assumption, even in the ‘quality’ press, that you should avoid challenging your readers. If this blog were not challenging, then I would be wasting my time writing it and there would be no point in you reading it.
The Forbes story also suggests that the blog’s ‘worst feature’ is being ‘Aussie-centric.’ The author of the story is perhaps unaware that one of the other eight economics bloggers profiled is a former resident of Australia. My other objective in writing this blog has in fact been to challenge the parochialism that sometimes afflicts discussion of public policy issues. An excellent example of this has been the attempt to frame debates about the US and Australian current account deficits and house price inflation in country-specific terms. Yet clearly there is a much bigger story here involving changes in the saving-investment preferences and financial technology of the Anglo-American economies. The cross-national perspective offered in this blog is hopefully a useful corrective to the more parochial perspective often found in the mainstream media, which still depends on a predominately local rather than global audience.
posted on 03 August 2005 by skirchner
in Economics
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Comments
Agreed. It was an unfair remark by the reviewer as well as inaccurate. I wouldn’t call Arnold Kling, for example, a globalist (not even nearly) yet, like you, he has an eye for intriguing questions that have global application. Congratulations, Stephen.
Posted by pwg on 08/03 at 03:07 PM
I thought it was fair and accurate up to a point and the author did acknowledge the broader relevance of the Australian experience. What amused me was the very ‘US centric’ assumption the journalist was making about his own readership. I would have thought Forbes aspired to a global readership!
The author accuses Lynne Kiesling (Knowledge Problem) of ‘irrelevant posts, which appear far too frequently,’ suggesting that he does not really understand the blogging medium. The excellent New Economist was criticised for its colour scheme, of all things. I think I got off lightly.
Posted by skirchner on 08/04 at 08:55 AM