Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Marxist (yuk) in your ass
Marxist (yuk) in your ass
I guess the idea of the VAT cut is that 'stimulating' spending on expensive (and often imported) non-essential goods is more important than doing something to more immediately help with the rising prices of little luxuries like food, energy and children's clothes.Anyway. 2%. Yawn. Maybe the tories are right, maybe it would have been better to fuck off the VAT cut and put the money straight into a tax cut for the lowest waged.
Not looking good - if you are one of the formerly 'Big Three'.
By way of weird synchronicity, I have been meaning to mention a really good new book I'm reading. It's by Donald McKenzie, a sociologist of science and scientific knowledge and should appeal to lots of people here (IMO). The book is called An Engine, Not a Camera, after Friedman's famous description of economic theory as an engine of analysis, rather than a purely descriptive camera. McKenzie takes the analogy further and shows how financial theory (if maybe not all economic theory per se -- Friedman himself was rather skeptical of the validity of finance as a scholarly discipline) is also an engine of production that shapes financial markets (cf. Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing theory). Anyway, it strikes me that there are some interesting parallels there with Marxism as a 'performative' theory, although I guess in general with Marxism the two-way nature of the relationship is more overt and explicit.
All over the world, it has become fashionable for Universities and Colleges to offer Masters degree programs in quantitative finance or financial engineering (FE), a code word meaning the solution of the Black-Scholes option pricing differential equation in as many ways as possible.
Revealing study of 'America's educational elite' here, which shows that in 2007 58% of male Harvard graduates went into finance or consulting, at what must be a massive opportunity cost in terms of human capital wasted on bubble career-paths since thrown into uncertainty due to the rebalancing of the global economy.
Yeah, he's criticised the Black-Scholes formula a lot and also criticised Black, Scholes and Merton (how come his name didn't get on the formula) more personally.It's impossible not to think of Nassim Nicholas Taleb at this point
Revealing study of 'America's educational elite' here, which shows that in 2007 58% of male Harvard graduates went into finance or consulting, at what must be a massive opportunity cost in terms of human capital wasted on bubble career-paths since thrown into uncertainty due to the rebalancing of the global economy.
Of equal interest is that certain occupations appear to better equip women to combine career and family. Physicians, for example, took the briefest non-employment spells after having a child. Ph.D.s were next in terms of length of spell, followed by lawyers, then by M.B.A.’s and those with other types of masters or no further degrees, who took the greatest amount of time off for family reasons. The amount of time taken off for each child decreased across the three cohorts, from 18 months per child for C1970 to 12 months per child for C1990. For those with a medical degree, just 2 months were taken per child among those in C1970 and C1990; and 4 months for those with a Ph.D. in C1970 and 5 months in C1990.9
How simply awful that a bunch of jumped-up business school muppets should find their youthful dreams of a life of carefree exploitation and cynical middle-manning scuppered by the reality that they are in fact worse than useless. The masses are no doubt crying into their gruel.Revealing study of 'America's educational elite' here, which shows that in 2007 58% of male Harvard graduates went into finance or consulting, at what must be a massive opportunity cost in terms of human capital wasted on bubble career-paths since thrown into uncertainty due to the rebalancing of the global economy.
Yep, can only see this as a good thing. Therefore not wasted human capital.If the good engineers stop making crappy structred credit and start making stuff that doesn't blow the financial system up, wouldn't the masses be a lot happier? Wouldn't you?
It's been apparent for quit some time, for some. But I guess these will be mostly kids going along with what they've been taught.vimothy said:Obviously, not smart enough to have figured out that they missed the boat, and thank god, because it's sitting in the middle of the sea taking on a lot of water, but smart enough to be usefully employed in, er, non-useless, non-bubble professions, not, you know, making toxic financial instruments.
These are smart, technically minded kids. Obviously, not smart enough to have figured out that they missed the boat, and thank god, because it's sitting in the middle of the sea taking on a lot of water, but smart enough to be usefully employed in, er, non-useless, non-bubble professions, not, you know, making toxic financial instruments.
They haven't missed the boat. In fact, if they've just done their A-levels, they've probably timed it perfectly!
There's going to be a short-term drop-off in demand for technical skills in finance, but only in a few areas - and only temporarily. I wouldn't trust anyone who argues that, long-term, financial markets are going to become less complex.
Maybe not less complex, but there will definitely be fewer entry level positions at the remaining investment banks, brokerage firms, etc, and not as many cushy seven figure bonus type positions in the finance sector in general. At least for the next 5-10 years. Wouldn't you think?
They haven't missed the boat. In fact, if they've just done their A-levels, they've probably timed it perfectly!
There's going to be a short-term drop-off in demand for technical skills in finance, but only in a few areas - and only temporarily. I wouldn't trust anyone who argues that, long-term, financial markets are going to become less complex.
I don't buy Taleb's argument that quants are to blame for the crisis or that the way forward is for banks to dispense with those skills.