Update: Steve Keen replies to my critique here.

140 characters are not a good basis for a debate about complex issues. Let me extricate myself from a potentially useful but frustrating twitter “debate” and write a short response to Prof. Steve Keen’s call to support Brexit.

I follow Steve Keen’s economic work at a distance but with interest and sympathy. Although I have not sought to make a career out of economic theorising, I broadly share many of his views on endogenous money and the central role of instability, uncertainty and bank debt in understanding economic developments. I was therefore surprised and disappointed to read his justification for supporting Brexit. Even if he did not formulate it as such, his statement is bound to be taken as a recommendation by his numerous followers and supporters. Yet his reasoning in the article is poor and – this is the most charitable explanation I can find – politically extremely naive.

There would be some additional points to make, but let me just address Keen’s two main arguments. [Read more…]