Hidden Morality

Barro argues many things, but in his attempts to argue for so many points, he often leaves substance behind. His chapter about countries, while morally questionable, is well supported, but the chapter about monopolies is especially weak in evidence.

Sometimes when it is difficult to tell when Barro is laying out moral judgements and when he is talking about causative relationships. The democracy and growth chapter is incredibly well supported, but he makes suggestions without worrying about what goal the United States should have in dealing with the developing world, let alone the opinions of the developing world, whose lives have been reduced to “GDP per capita.” That being said, I think his data is excellent, probably better than anything we saw in Elliott’s class.

As far as the NCAA monopoly, I agree with Hillary. It is a bold move by Barro to insult the basketball player that comes from poverty and goes to a university for 4 years without any data. When discussing the Ivy League monopoly, Barro falls back upon an argument he has already labeled as inefficient (and therefore implicitly immoral). Barro claims the monopoly power of the universities subsidizing education for the poor is a bad idea, but supports this by saying that if anything, the government should make the transfer! I don’t know if Barro is implying that the transfer should not happen in general, or simply leaving the difficult questions of morality out of the discussion because it is easier to make a straw man out of the Ivy League’s bold moral action. Barro seems to forget that as a non-profit, the position of an Ivy League school need not reflect the goal of maximizing profits, but rather of gathering the best students, which both affirmative action and price discrimination work toward. His peak cockiness is shown at the end of the monopoly chapter, when discussing how ridiculous it is that anyone can claim the title economist. I enjoy reading rants like this, but it takes away from the academic nature of the rest of the text. Barro reminds me a little of Matt Drudge, but obviously more intelligent.