Lew’s post is excellent, and it exposes what I think is the real weakness of the current crop of “elite” economists.  I pulled up the letter and saw that a large number of the signees were from the Ivy League institutions or places like Chicago and Northwestern.  In other words, the “highest-ranking” economists are the ones who are absolutely clueless about money and are cravenly ignorant about the Fed.

To these “economists,” money is nothing more than a quantity variable to be manipulated by monetary authorities to have certain macro effects.  The notion that money is a good — a real good — that is used for indirect exchange never crosses their minds.  These people would be outraged if government constantly messed with their cars or their houses to constantly devalue them, yet they insist that such manipulation is necessary for our prosperity.  They may call it “economics,” but I call it fraud.