Larry Summers, ex–Harvard president and Treasury secretary, summarized it so well: “Good empirical evidence tells its story regardless of the precise way in which it is analyzed. In large part, it is its simplicity that makes it persuasive. Physicists do not compete to find more elaborate ways to observe falling apples. Instead they have made progress because theory has sought inspiration from a wide range of empirical phenomena. Macroeconomics could progress in the same way. But progress is unlikely, as long as macroeconomists require the armor of a stochastic pseudo-world before doing battle
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