Re: Re: Re: Re: Thanks Brad, was The legacy of Juan Perón

[Jim Devine <jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Brad wrote:
> > Since you have read Amsden, you know that the policies that she
> > recommends are the complete opposite of those that Peron pursued. Amsden
> > believes in subsidizing exports. Peron taxed them.

I wrote:
> These are different situations, referring to different kinds of products.
> It makes sense for an agricultural country -- like one producing beef --
> to tax imports if the elasticity of demand is very low. If you think that
> building up manufacturing (as opposed to agriculture for export) is the
> way to develop a country, then it makes sense to subsidize exports of
> manufactures and tax those of agricultural commodities. It encourages
> agriculture to refocus on the domestic market (Food First!) while building
> up infant industries.

I add:
A key error that many economists make is to apply the same recipe to all
countries. (The most blatant example is the IMF's cookie-cutter approach,
even according to Joseph Stiglitz, formerly of the World Bank.) Why should
the same policies be applied to a export-oriented agricultural economy
(Argentina) that work for a completely different country that's getting all
sorts of subsidies from the US (S. Korea)? Shouldn't the people who
actually live in the country and know the economy intimately be allowed to
apply their "special knowledge" rather than being pushed to apply a
standard model? (Why should we assume that the IMF knows better, when their
folks gain their knowledge based on short visits and shaky statistics.)

It seems to me that Amsden would agree: rather than starting with a single
model that's supposed to apply to all countries, she develops her story of
South Korea inductively.

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine