>>Economists are not "hostile" to public goods. I guess I did overstate it a bit. Among my more conservative, pro-market economist friends, there is a general suspicion of the public goods argument. I think that mostly, this comes from a distrust of government. Fair enough. Anyway, that is where my comment was coming from.
-Jeff >>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 08/01/04 05:02PM >>> In a message dated 8/1/04 3:45:57 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: >>Economists are not "hostile" to public goods. > >Still, knowledge of economics tends to make you more receptive to the >idea of the invisible hand and the possibilities of private economic >organization. Hence, it makes you more libertarian. And libertarians are >sure hostile to the public goods scene, because there the emphasis is on >things that *need* to be solved publicly. While studying economics might tend to make a person more libertarian than he'd be otherwise, studying economics doesn't necessarily make the person libertarian. The old Keynesians tended to have a fair fondness for government intervention, as summarized by Paul Samuelson's "Two cheers, but not three, for markets." A Post-Keynesian instructor of mine back in 1990 told me that Post-Keynesians would say "One cheer for markets."
