Fwd: How a student took on eminent economists on debt issue-and won; Did a Spreadsheet Error Cost You Your Job?
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National Jobs for All Coalition
Apr 19, 2013, 12:21:13 PM4/19/13
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How a student took on eminent economists on debt issue - and won By Edward Krudy
NEW YORK (Reuters) - When Thomas Herndon, a student at the University of
Massachusetts Amherst's doctoral program in economics, spotted possible
errors made by two eminent Harvard economists in an influential research
paper, he called his girlfriend over for a second look.
As they poured over the spreadsheets Herndon had requested from Harvard's
Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff, which formed the basis for a widely
quoted 2010 study, they spotted what they believed were glaring errors.....
In the world of economic luminaries, it doesn't get much bigger than
Reinhart and Rogoff, whose work has had enormous influence in one of the
biggest economic policy debates of the age.....
Their study, which found economic growth slows dramatically when a
government's debt exceeds 90 percent of a country's annual economic output,
has been cited by policymakers around the world as justification for
slashing spending......
Did a Spreadsheet Error Cost You Your Job? By Dean Baker Yahoo! Finance | The Exchange – Wed, Apr 17, 2013
Did an Excel error cost you your job? This is what people around the world should be asking after researchers at the University of Massachusetts uncovered a serious calculation mistake. The mistake was in an enormously influential paper by Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, two prominent economists, which purports to show that high levels of government debt lead to slow economic growth.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - When Thomas Herndon, a student at the University of
Massachusetts Amherst's doctoral program in economics, spotted possible
errors made by two eminent Harvard economists in an influential research
paper, he called his girlfriend over for a second look.
As they poured over the spreadsheets Herndon had requested from Harvard's
Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff, which formed the basis for a widely
quoted 2010 study, they spotted what they believed were glaring errors.....
In the world of economic luminaries, it doesn't get much bigger than
Reinhart and Rogoff, whose work has had enormous influence in one of the
biggest economic policy debates of the age.....
Their study, which found economic growth slows dramatically when a
government's debt exceeds 90 percent of a country's annual economic output,
has been cited by policymakers around the world as justification for
slashing spending......
Did a Spreadsheet Error Cost You Your Job? By Dean Baker Yahoo! Finance | The Exchange – Wed, Apr 17, 2013
Did an Excel error cost you your job? This is what people around the world should be asking after researchers at the University of Massachusetts uncovered a serious calculation mistake. The mistake was in an enormously influential paper by Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, two prominent economists, which purports to show that high levels of government debt lead to slow economic growth.
This paper has been widely cited by political figures around the world who have been pushing the case for cutting back government spending and raising taxes. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan famously cited Reinhart and Rogoff when he laid out his budget earlier this year. So have many of the politicians now pushing for cuts in Social Security and Medicare.
Reinhart and Rogoff’s work has had an extraordinary impact
for an academic paper. This is why the calculation error is so
important. When the error is corrected, the relationship
between debt levels and economic growth is far less clear.....
National Jobs for All Coalition
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