Comment of the Day: : Current Links: "One excellent point in the fine Blanchard-Krugman discussion...
...was Olivier's listing of the top MIT macro people in the 1970s. He included Franco Modigliani (personal note: my primary advisor). It's odd that Franco often gets left out in the recent spate of work reviewing macro in that decade. He didn't go toe-to-toe in the methodology debates, and was (relatively) quiet on US policy issues. Still (and it's silly to even have to write this) he was a giant in the profession, and fully active at the time and thinking about the issues involved--his AEA presidential address is a good account of his concerns about where the rational expectations work might be leading. His paper with Stan Fischer reviewing the costs of inflation is a good starting point for people who want to know why somebody like Olivier is untroubled by the thoughts of (gasp) 4% inflation.
