After the 2008 "new Great Crisis," it is widely recognized that mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics--the last result of Lucas's anti-Keynesian revolution of the 1980s, which tried to give macroeconomics sound neo-Walrasian microeconomic bases -- has failed to anticipate and then appraise the crisis. Has this crisis revealed a failure of this macroeconom(etr)ics as a scientific theory? Mainstream macroeconomists defend their models on the basis of their alleged superiority in terms of clarity and coherence. The thesis of this article is that this claim about superiority is false. The study argues that the reasons for the failure of mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics--in particular its poor predictive performance and interpretative weakness-- reside in the implications of the neo-Walrasian legacy and the problems connected with the implementation of that program.

Is Neo-Walrasian Macroeconomics a Dead End? An Assessment of Recent Criticisms of DSGE Models

Sella L
2017

Abstract

After the 2008 "new Great Crisis," it is widely recognized that mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics--the last result of Lucas's anti-Keynesian revolution of the 1980s, which tried to give macroeconomics sound neo-Walrasian microeconomic bases -- has failed to anticipate and then appraise the crisis. Has this crisis revealed a failure of this macroeconom(etr)ics as a scientific theory? Mainstream macroeconomists defend their models on the basis of their alleged superiority in terms of clarity and coherence. The thesis of this article is that this claim about superiority is false. The study argues that the reasons for the failure of mainstream macroeconom(etr)ics--in particular its poor predictive performance and interpretative weakness-- reside in the implications of the neo-Walrasian legacy and the problems connected with the implementation of that program.
2017
Istituto di Ricerca sulla Crescita Economica Sostenibile - IRCrES
DSGE models; Lucas; neo-Walrasian macroeconom(etr)ics; theory-driven econometrics
File in questo prodotto:
Non ci sono file associati a questo prodotto.

I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14243/358343
Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
  • Scopus ND
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.isi??? ND
social impact