Can you please state what you think the supposed myth actually is? I'm asking because people seem to have very different ideas about what it actually is as seen in this very thread.
> I think he was specifically targeting neoclassical economists.
Quoting Graber:
> The answer seems to be that the Myth of Barter cannot go away, because it is central to the entire discourse of economics. Recall here what Smith was trying to do when he wrote The Wealth of Nations. Above all, the book was an attempt to establish the newfound discipline of economics as a science.
> Nope, he just has an unusual take because his analysis is more rooted in historical and anthropological study and, of course, he's kind of left wing.
I'm sorry, Adam Smith is left wing?
>I'm sorry, Adam Smith is left wing?
I was referring to Graeber. He was left wing and anticapitalist.
Orthodox (neoclassical) economists like Mankiw tend to be very strongly pro-corporate due to way funding flows in the profession.
Interesting. Did you actually read Debt? Because Graeber himself says that economists don't claim a barter system as a historical fact:
> It's important to emphasize that this is not presented as something that actually happened, but as a purely imaginary exercise.
As I suspected, it seems you're arguing something else entirely
I lifted a different example from some other lecture notes in my link above where they just flat out said "this is what used to happen".
Really, there is no shortage of examples. It's the same myth in all cases, (although I wouldnt be surprised if some econ textbooks got patched since the book came out).
Im not sure exactly what youre trying to prove here. The distinction you're trying to highlight is hardly material.
Yes, I obviously did read the book. I also used to believe the myth because I first read it in an undergraduate econ textbook.
> It's important to emphasize that this is not presented as something that actually happened, but as a purely imaginary exercise. "To see that society benefits from a medium of exchange" write Begg, Fischer and Dornbuch (Economics, 2oos), "imagine a barter economy. " "Imagine the difficulty you would have today," write Maunder, Myers, Wall, and Miller (Economics Explairzed, 1991) , "if you had to exchange your labor directly for the fruits of someone else's labor." "Imagine," write Parkin and King (Economics, 1995) , "you have roosters, but you want roses".
He quotes Stiglitz after this and remarks:
> Again this is just a make-believe land
Before claiming it's the same myth it's necessary to clarify what the myth actually is and why it supposedly is so important for capitalism.
> Yes, I obviously did read the book. I also used to believe the myth because I first read it in an undergraduate econ textbook.
In a deleted comment you claimed you read it in Mankiw. There it is most definitely presented as a thought experiment asking the reader to imagine the inconvenience of barter.
A) it's been presented as both. The example you pointedly ignored that I posted above is one such example.
B) It's not really that material. The story serves the same purpose either way - both in the above example and in, say, Stiglitz.
>it's necessary to clarify what the myth actually is and why it supposedly is so important for capitalism.
It is which is why Graeber did explain why it's important.
I thought you read the book?
>In a deleted comment you claimed you read it in Mankiw.
After writing that comment I double checked the 8th edition of the text to see if i remembered correctly and ctrl-f and found zero about barter in the whole book so I guess we both misremembered.
I cant honestly remember which econ textbook I read it in since it was 16 years ago, but I do know that I read it and believed it and there are plenty of other examples that can be found via google, so whatever.
Nobody thinks this is the mainstream consensus view, not even Graeber.
> The story serves the same purpose either way
> It is which is why Graeber did explain why it's important.
The whole thread is about why Graber's just-so explanations are wrong. And your arguments are materially different from what is actually in the text.
> I guess we both misremembered.
From The Principles of Macroeconomics, 3rd Edition. Chapter 15 - The Monetary System
> The social custom of using money for transactions is extraordinarily useful in a large, complex society. Imagine, for a moment, that there was no item in the economy widely accepted in exchange for goods and services.
This borders on conspiracy theory. I was in an econ PhD program for years (though I never quite finished the dissertation), and trust me, economists working in the neoclassical tradition do not need corporate funding to be right of center. Most academic economists aren't getting corporate funding.
And there are plenty of left-wing economists whose work is nevertheless mainstream in the sense of living within the neoclassical paradigm.
> The myth is that barter arose spontaneously throughout history and that currency arose as a more efficient means of mediating barter.
Economists mostly don't care how money arose, and 99.999% of theories in economics would be unchanged if money arose after barter, after credit and debt, or as a result of aliens implanting the idea in ancient peoples' brains.
I find it overwhelmingly ironic that economists consider "people respond to incentives" as a fundamental building block of economic theory but when the topic is "do economists respond to incentives?" the answer is no, they are only interested in truth.
>Most academic economists aren't getting corporate funding.
Most programmers arent employed by FAANG but that doesnt stop armies of the ones that arent from idolizing the goog. Using money to build prestige that goes with money does a better job than straight up bribery.
Economists are the best paid social scientists by far thanks to the injection of money. Having a seat at the policy table has its advantages - advantages that anthropologists dont get.
>And there are plenty of left-wing economists whose work is nevertheless mainstream in the sense of living within the neoclassical paradigm.
I wonder if you are using, say, Paul "footsoldier of the DNC" Krugman as an example of "left wing" here because I cant think of any.
>Economists mostly don't care how money arose
The book addresses this point and explains why Adam Smith (and subsequent thinkers) did care. It's worth a read.
The myth is certainly taught by mainstream economists, here is one example:
http://www2.york.psu.edu/~dxl31/econ14/lecture18.html
>And Graber doesn't stop there. He pretends like somehow all of economics is hinged upon this Myth of Barter.
I think he was specifically targeting neoclassical economists. The idea of Homo Economicus is essentially rooted in a number of myths that depict humans as spherical cows, Adam Smith's story of money emerging from barter being just one.
>Adam Smith is not the supreme arbiter and law-giver of economics.
Nope, he just has an unusual take because his analysis is more rooted in historical and anthropological study and, of course, he's kind of left wing. This angers people who try to gatekeep economic thought, limiting it to the likes of neoliberal (but still somehow mainstream) ideologues like Mankiw or Milton Friedman.
I guarantee that when David Koch made an large donation to Florida State U economics department he didn't do it with the idea that they would teach more Graeber.