Author Archives: samuelbarbour

The past six months have been unusual for me in the ways that they’ve been unusual for a lot of folks in the US – there’s a pandemic, and near everything is disrupted. One of the effects of pandemic life for me was that I spent a great deal of time reading to my four-year-old.Continue reading “Engine Stories”

So in my last post, I tried to offer up a generalized version of the cockamamie narrative-making machinery of my mind – basically, I think of people trying to advance the interests of the “good guys” whilst minimizing those the “bad guys.” Whatever that means. It occurred to me later that any reader would almostContinue reading “Equilibrating”

I’m prone to a kind of cheap psychologizing – the way I put narratives together for myself involves creating morality stories to represent various actors in a given situation. Let me give you an example. There’s a music video that came out 11 years ago that depicts a rap battle between Keynes and Hayek. ItContinue reading “Psychologizing”

On any given day, there is a very small chance that something very unusual will happen. By definition, right? And most of time, if something unusual happens, people can work it out. We have backups, insurance, people we can count on, and so on. But say, for some reason, some crucial support for the societalContinue reading “Break it down”

The story goes like this: once upon a time, there were nation-states effectively ruled by aristocrats, and the liberals are the ones pushing for political reforms that lead to the empowerment of the middle and lower classes. And then there’s a big war, a tumultuous peace, and another big war. And liberalism wins! Except inContinue reading “Some thoughts on neoliberalism”

I’m teaching four macroeconomics classes this semester, one an eight-week online course, the other three in standard classroom settings. I can live with online, but the classroom is more fun. I’ve been doing this almost three years now, and I’m sort of getting the hang of it. All that is a matter of experience, IContinue reading “Teaching Macro”

A musician friend of mine posted on the ‘book a quote from a philosopher, “let me write a nation’s songs, and I care not who writes its laws…” I recognized it immediately from the well-known Paul Samuelson quote “I don’t care who writes a nation’s laws—or crafts its advanced treaties—if I can write its economicsContinue reading “The Fletcher-Samuelson Link”

The title of today’s blog post is a reference to Van Halen’s 1984 hit “Hot for Teacher” – I’ve always loved the guitar and drums intro on that number. Spelling out references defeats the purpose, doesn’t it? I enjoy watching clever post-modern cartoons, and I imitate their signiture move of making pop culture references, butContinue reading “I don’t feel tardy”

I wanted to do a series of posts on Facebook of some favorite records. It’s one of those damned trends, and people tag each other and rope each other into participating, at least in theory, or whatever. I went and posted something about how I was surprised nobody had tagged me. I used to haveContinue reading “Ten Albums, etc.”

I tried to write a breathless account of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s performance of Mahler’s Ninth the other day, and it totally didn’t work. One of the difficulties of writing about classical music is that descibing the experience of hearing something depends on bridging the gap between your own frame of reference and somebody else’s.Continue reading “Mahler 9”