Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Voodoo Economics Part Deux

Greenspan on The Daily Show:

"I've been dealing with these big mathematical models of forecasting the economy, and I'm looking at what's going on in the last few weeks. … If I could figure out a way to determine whether or not people are more fearful or changing to more euphoric, and have a third way of figuring out which of the two things are working, I don't need any of this other stuff... Forecasting 50 years ago was as good or as bad as it is today. And the reason is that human nature hasn't changed. "

I nearly choked to death laughing. No truer words just surprising to hear him speak them on national television. S'okay Alan, probably no one except a handful of geeky traders really noticed much less understood what you were saying.

Sometimes life is fun. I'm off to rattle some chicken bones.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think it means he knows just about as much as the rest of us. I had a good laugh, too.

Anonymous said...

I've always believed that if someone said they understood economics they were a damn liar.

I think it's just all FM...fuckin' magic.

Not Your Mama said...

Just understand how humans behave. Economics is nothing but how humans behave with money, everything else is hocus-pocus.

Flimsy Sanity said...

That was such a great interview. I liked when Stewart commented that our whole economy was set up to reward the investor and punish the working man or something to that effect.

ryk said...

Economics is nothing but how humans behave with money

Yes. It's a herd mentality, too. With about one stampede off a cliff per decade. I think we're in the middle of one right now, running hard for the cliff without a clue what's ahead.

Not Your Mama said...

It is. If most people ever figured that out it would throw a huge monkey wrench into the current game plan.

TomCat said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
TomCat said...

Hate those typos the spell-check misses. :-(

Economic forecasting is the art of deciding what you think, and developing the statistical models to support it, but even an idiot could forecast that trickle down would gush up.

Vigilante said...

I've sworn off watching anyone on Teevee with "G.O.P." next to his name. And Greenspin's is just one more of those bloodsuckers.....

Desert Beacon said...

Could it be that Greenspan's crypticism covered confusion? Fact is, that Greenspan's not predicted much that has actually happened. The benefit of being in his former position was that if bad stuff didn't happen it was "because of his policy shifts," and if "good things happened" it was because of his police pronouncement -- he had it coming and going. Precious few business beat writers really caught on to his perpetual hedging, dodging, and they weren't writing for the WSJ.