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Showing posts from June, 2014

Ray on Milanovic on Ray on Piketty

Branko Milanovic  has commented in some detail  on a  recent post of mine , about Piketty's  Capital in the Twenty First Century.  My initial urge was not to reply. But I see that Branko's post is getting a fair amount of attention on the net, with a wealth of approving accompanying comments about theorists who know nothing of that grand place, the Real World.  So here is an attempt to point out why Branko's post is problematic. Not that it will help much with the general public who are (to some extent understandably) distrustful of academic arguments. And we all know it never ends: the title of this post puts me in mind of the little old lady who snapped, "Young man,  it's turtles all the way down !"  Preamble. At various points Branko claims that I bring to bear a ahistorical, abstract set of arguments on what is a vibrant historical process. In doing so I'm apparently missing all the nuanced depth of Piketty's Laws. It is hard to convey just how st