There is a very famous novel. It tells the story of a character named Chance, a middle-aged and very simple-minded gardener, who lives in the large mansion of a wealthy man in the city of Washington. This man, Chance, who has spent his entire life in that house, only knows about the outside world what he knows through television.. When his benefactor dies, the lawyers in charge of the inheritance force him to leave the house for the first time, and already on the streets, Through a series of confusions, he ends up sheltered by high society, television, politics, among whose members, each innocent and simple phrase that Chance utters is taken for a piece of revealing wise knowledge.. The novel, considered one of Jerzy Kosinski’s most significant works, is often seen as a satirical look at the “fantasy” of media culture. Any references that sound familiar?
It seems obvious, but as Hemingway said, it takes two years to learn to speak and sixty to learn to be silent. That is why we only have to refer to what has been said. And that is where the doubts seem to emerge. Is it likely that Milei overwhelms with shouts and technical economism that he himself does not fully understand? Could it be that the economist does not understand much about economics?
The formula for success: not to be understood
If there is something that distinguishes Javier Milei, it is confusion during his economic presentations. Aside from the fact that the bulk of his interventions are dedicated to finance, there is not much record of his knowledge of production, economic development or international trade, to mention three important items. Strictly speaking, and from the diagnosis of his own colleagues, it seems that he does not have extensive knowledge of the subject and only adjusts to some minor definitions that are usually not understandable to the general public.
This refers not only to when dollarization is usually brought into the picture. It is known that economists of both orthodoxy and heterodoxy have ruled out the dollarization project, starting with the obvious: there are not enough dollars to convert pesos.. When Milei talks about dollarization, her responses tend to be vague, changing, accommodating to the level of knowledge of the interlocutor and even violent to inhibit any questioning.
In practically all his technical explanations, he usually addresses concepts that he never finishes completing, outlining definitions that do not always have logic behind them. It is even common to hear him evoke references to authors of the Austrian School of economics who do not have a relevant specific weight.
So, the strategy looks pristine: he uses insults as a rule and usually displays erudition, capitalizing at times on ignorance, at times on the obedience of his fearful interlocutors.
Hand on the heart: what day and time was it that Milei used to explain simply and well how he would dollarize the economy if he became president? She doesn’t know, she doesn’t answer.
Abastonomics: nothing is as it seems
Without underestimating his great media magnetism and his emotional intelligence, the novelty is that, if his most technical economic definitions are reviewed, the bulk of it sums up error or, at least, arouses suspicion. If you think about it, maybe Milei presumes a capacity or knowledge that, perhaps, he does not possess. It would be long to quote each sentence from León del Abasto, but the unique thing is that all the examples adapt well to these hypotheses. It is not said here that the candidate cannot distinguish the security forces from the armed forces, but it is said that he is unable to differentiate international trade from the functions of diplomacy.
For example, Milei argued that the purchasing power of salaries was greater in the 90s than today. Answer? It was not. Taking the real median salary of the registered private sector and based on data from Indec and the Ministry of Labor, strictly speaking, today it is almost 50% higher than in 1998. The calculation belongs to sociologist Daniel Schteingart. Milei said the average income in convertibility was $1,800 per person per month. However, the average formal private salary at that time was $810.
Another phrase from Milei: “When you look at the Argentine per capita product, it is 15% below (2011),” he said. Answer: it’s a lie. Although 2011 was the highest point of GDP per capita in Argentina, since then, this indicator has registered a drop of between 9% and 10%. Not 15%. Another one: “With you as Minister of Economy, income fell by 33%,” Milei told Massa. However, since Massa took office in August 2022, none of these indicators show a drop like the one indicated by Milei.
By left and right
But there is much more. A few weeks ago, the candidate for La Libertad Avanza pointed out that “market failures do not exist.” This is a statement framed in an ultra-orthodox tradition whose purpose is to establish the “freedom” of the market to allocate resources, tasks and prices. That definition was debunked by economists left and right.. Miguel Braun, former Secretary of Commerce of the government of Mauricio Macri, answered: “They are called market failures in economic literature. They occur when there are externalities, for example, which are non-pecuniary effects of the transaction. Classic example: pollution. A tannery throws waste into the river for free. “It’s very brutal Milei,” he published on X (ex Twitter). The former vice minister of Economy in the administration of Alberto Fernández Haroldo Montagú also responded: “As a climate change denier it is very good that he does not notice the externalities. “Public goods and services such as defense and security, what are they?”
A few weeks ago, Luis Palma Cané, economist and specialist in international finance, also crossed Javier Milei for his statements about fixed terms in pesos.. “Milei knows much less about economics than she lets on. When she doesn’t know, she starts talking about history. A lot of things she says are not correct,” she said.
The notes, the failure, the lack
A few months ago, the economist and professor Constantino Hevia questioned how much Javier Milei knows about economics. “If you scratch a little, you realize that Milei knows much less about economics than he and people believe,” he said on X (ex Twitter) when analyzing – among other things – the presidential candidate’s handwritten notes for his speech to businessmen at the Llao Llao hotel. Immediately afterwards, Professor Hevia quoted Milei, who disqualified critics of dollarization by saying that they do not understand “the condition of transversality.” The professor was shocked by the clumsiness of the presentation and published a long theoretical evidence on “By trying to make everyone ignorant and using pseudoscientific discourse, he confuses the public and grows his figure as a technician, or mathematical economist as he likes to call himself. The truth is that Milei is technically weak. The example in his notes is very clear,” says Hevia.
Back to Chance. As said, the character has spent his entire life in that house and only knows about the outside world what he knows through television seems to return again and again. Confusions through, cradled by high society, television, politics, history tells the course is known. “It’s not what you see, but how you see it,” someone might say.. And what was supposed to be eye-opening knowledge then falls into a spiral of disappointments. The magic no longer works. And neither are the screams.
Source: Ambito
