OECD Economic Survey of Ireland… compulsory reading? Ahem. The rich truly are different. November 6, 2009
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.trackback
I had another laugh today, rereading Finfacts overview of the OECD Economic Survey of Ireland.
The OECD’s Economic Survey of Ireland was launched in Dublin today by Angel Gurría, Secretary General of the Paris-based OECD, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development – – the think tank for 30 mainly developed countries – – and the Minister for Finance, Brian Lenihan. The Minister welcomed what he termed the OECD’s fair and balanced assessment of the Irish economy and said it should be “compulsory reading” for understanding the challenges the country faces. The Minister warned about “false economic scientists” and told Finfacts at the launch press conference that he supported administrative transparency on public spending and cited the merit of publishing politicians’ expenses.
Well, that’s a mighty interesting comment, is it not, about ‘false economic scientists’. What on earth can he mean? Are they somehow not real? Or is it that they disagree with him? Or could it be that he thinks they are lying? For the want of a follow-up question – eh?
Meanwhile, you’ve got to love his comment on the ‘fair and balanced assessment’ from the OECD which should apparently be ‘compulsory reading’… Really Minister? Perhaps he should mosey along to the OECD online bookshop where he will discover that the price of said document is a far from inconsiderable €39… €39 in e-book/PDF format?
Feck’s sake.
How much again is the weekly Jobseekers Benefit… what’s that you say?
The Cedar Lounge Revolution 
Economics is not a science, so there can be no ‘economic scientists’, false or otherwise.
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That’s very true. And to add to that it genuinely is a matter of interpretation. There are models but it’s difficult, given the economic history of the last century to have any certainty about their appropriateness in any context. That’s something I was trying to get across on the other OECD thread…
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Maybe Lenny was trying for a quasi-biblical false prophet effect with that odd phrase.
If that’s the case, well it’s an unfortunate choice of phraseology … seeing how his bosses, former and present, so roundly dismissed the “false prophets of doom” back in those heady days when it seemed the boom could only get boomier.
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Very true. And it’s like you were saying on the OECD thread the way data is interpreted also can throw up not so great results (from everyones point of view I will admit).
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How much again is the weekly Jobseekers Benefit
More now than it’s going to be, I shouldn’t wonder
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That seems about right ejh… the guns are out and the target is in the sights… 😦
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-Now, of course, we know that the gulf between assumption and reality was too wide to be bridged. These models were worse than unrealistic. They were weapons of economic mass destruction-
Barry Eichengreen
http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=21274
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