Laundry Day

I'm doing two loads right now, and it's really not enjoyable at all. Who would've thought?

Here is the difference between two of my professors, Pichler and Sitz:

Pichler teaches my 9 o'clock on Tuesdays. He gave us an assignment the first week which asked us to solve the Truncated Keynesian model. The assignment required knowledge of something called the "Keynesian Cross" which was never taught to me, and apparently many other students. This week he told us the distribution. There where 7 F's or about a third of the class. He was completely baffled at the thought that we didn't put enough thought into the assignment when it would've taken 5 minutes. He also critcized the sloppiness of what we handed in. I don't know about the rest of the students, but he introduced the assignment as a "test of your peers," which I took to mean he wasn't going to collect it. If I'd have known that, I wouldn't have done it on scrap paper and used different notation than his. I don't like the C for consumption, I for investment and c for MPC. I prefer sticking to lower case letters, which meant that I used alpha for MPC. And I had stuff scratched out. I wouldn't mind him so much if he didn't act like we were all idiots for not know the Keynesian Cross. Plus he calls solving a system of equations something fourth graders could do. I'd like to see a fourth grader solve the systems he's giving us. When he talks, it sounds like there's a special little secret between the him and the class and everyone's in on it. Well, I'm not. In general, he just seems like a pompous ass and I don't feel I've learned anything I couldn't have looked up in a book. He makes a lot of normative statements like they're positive.

Sitz, on the other hand, actually teaches. He asks us if we get the calculations he's making and if someone says something, he goes back and explains a bit more. Today he was talking about a model he'll be teaching next time. It's based on the Keynesian model, which he was kind enough to go through a very simple explanation of the model and the multipliers. I doubt he would've gone through this explanation if the class was full of Austrians, but he recognizes that in other countries, especially the US, the Keynesian view is not as commonly accepted as it (apparently) is in Austria. He explained the difference between the "Real Cycle" (RBC) and the approach he would be explaining (the key difference he mentioned was that in the RBC it's assumed that P and W are flexible while Keynesian's see them as rigid). The reason he thinks the RBC is more popular in the states is because there aren't as generous unemployment benefits which he said made the labor market more flexible. I agree, but I don't think that the inflexibilty of the European labor market is any more inflexible than the US labor market. If unemployment benefits were the same across markets, I think the unemployment rate would generally be the same. But maybe he said this and it was lost in translation. The point is, Sitz doesn't assume we all intuitively know what he's talking about and judge us on that regard. He's a good professor.

So. That's my little rant for today. And I know the Pichler part's a little scattered, but it's because he pisses me off. He's also the guy who threw the overhead at the wall, if that tells you anything.