May 9th, 2013 → 6:39 am @ Lea // No Comments

“[They] who
With half the bulk o’th’ world played as [they] pleased,
Making and marring fortunes.”  – Antony and Cleopatra

Here’s Shakespeare’s version of Keynes’ famous quote about defunct economists influencing the world.  And unfortunately, perhaps, sometimes it is true.  The discredited study by Reinhart-Rogoff on debt limits really got too much currency; even had it been empirically correct it got too much attention – it was just one study!  Theory advances by repeated results over time.  Having said that, I came across an academic study last week whose purpose was to repeat the empirical results of a rather famous health care study from the 1980s.  And it was beautiful!  No cheating uncovered, empirical results repeated and advanced upon, conclusions and updates made.  Now this is what academic research is about.