Talk:Mark Weisbrot

What's with the <!--Please do not display age per BLP--> and the missing date of birth? That is not not common practice, that is we do give the date of birth (or at least they year) if it is publicly documented/known. So why is is it not the case here? Is there special conflict or administrational decision not to provide it?--Kmhkmh (talk) 06:33, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello, I've added a COI tag and would like to suggest improvements to the article. It is currently incomplete in that some sections have not been kept current, and the information presented is true but not an accurate reflection of the subject's subsequent or current positions.

The article is also incomplete because it focuses on policy around Latin America almost exclusively and neglects work on Europe and Asia. The current subheadings under Economics Career are:

Globalization

Latin America

Venezuela

South of the Border

Columns

Books

I would like to suggest the following header structure for new sections that would make the article more encyclopedic and complete.

Globalization

Latin America

Venezuela

South of the Border

Europe

European Economic Crisis

Greece

Asia

Columns

Books

Below, I have included proposed text and citations for the new sections. Thank you and I welcome any feedback.

Weisbrot has written and co-authored research papers and articles on the economies and politics of Latin America and the Caribbean for the past two decades. The countries covered include Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, and Venezuela.Beginning in 2001, Weisbrot challenged the prevailing consensus on the 1998–2002 Argentine great depression, arguing that IMF-supported austerity was counter-productive and that the country needed to devalue its currency in order to recover. After the Argentine government defaulted on its debt at the end of 2001 and allowed the currency to float against the dollar at the beginning of 2002, Weisbrot continued to argue against what he called harmful attempts by the IMF to influence policy in the post-default period.^[1]

He later wrote papers arguing that Argentina's policies in the 2002-2011 period, after its default and separation from the IMF, were successful.

Weisbrot has argued that, from 2003 to 2011, Brazil was successful in reducing poverty and inequality and increasing GDP growth.^[2]

Weisbrot attributed these successes in part to policy changes that were an improvement over the neoliberal program Brazil adopted in the 1980s. However, he was critical of austerity and high interest rates after 2010, arguing that these were unnecessary and led to a prolonged recession. Weisbrot argued against the impeachment of former Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff in 2016 and the corruption conviction of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in 2018, pointing to a lack of precedent and evidence to justify the proceedings.^[3]In a 2019 report on the IMF program for Ecuador, Weisbrot found that the program was not likely to prevent continuing recession or reduce unemployment.^[4][5]

Articles in The New York Times,^[6]USA Today,^[7]and The Washington Post^[8]described Weisbrot as supportive of some of the policies implemented during Hugo Chávez's presidency. In a 2016 National Review article about Venezuela's deterioration following the Bolivarian Revolution, José Cárdenas described Weisbrot as one of the "leftist admirers of Venezuela" and an "ardent cheerleader" of Chávez's policies.^[9]

In 2013, Weisbrot praised the Venezuelan government for its gains in poverty, real income, employment, healthcare, and education, and said that the possibility of hyperinflation was "very remote", that economic problems were "not likely" and that "Venezuela has sufficient reserves".^[10]

A 2019 report by Weisbrot and Jeffrey Sachs said that a 31% rise in the number of deaths between 2017 and 2018 was due to the sanctions imposed on Venezuela in 2017, and that 40,000 people in Venezuela may have died as a result.^[11]The report states: "The sanctions are depriving Venezuelans of lifesaving medicines, medical equipment, food, and other essential imports."^[11]Weisbrot stated that he "could not prove those excess deaths were the result of sanctions, but said the increase ran parallel to the imposition of the measures and an attendant fall in oil production".^[11]

A US State Department spokesperson said that, "as the writers themselves concede, the report is based on speculation and conjecture"^[11]while Harvard economist Ricardo Hausmann, representative to the Inter-American Development Bank by the US-supported administration of Juan Guaidó,^[12]said that the analysis was flawed because it made invalid assumptions about Venezuela based on a different country, Colombia, that the analysis failed to rule out other explanations and that it failed to correctly account for PDVSA finances.^[13]

Weisbrot was an advisor,^[14]and co-wrote with Tariq Ali the screenplay for the Oliver Stone's 2009 film, South of the Border,^[15]which examined the "pink tide" of elected leftist governments in South America.

Weisbrot disagreed with Larry Rohter, the former South American bureau chief of The New York Times, over his statements on Venezuela, where Rohter said that in support of the film South of the Border, Weisbrot, Tariq Ali, and Oliver Stone manipulated data to present a positive image of Hugo Chávez.^[16]

Rohter described Weisbrot as "... an economist, not a historian, and apparently not a very good one", suggesting that he was "Either ... incompetent [or] deliberately manipulating the numbers."^[16] Weisbrot contested the claims of inaccuracies, suggesting that they are indicative of sloppy and misleading coverage of Venezuela in the popular press and saying that "the way most Americans get the idea that Venezuela is a dictatorship, for example, is from these editorials".^[17]

Weisbrot contends that the Great Recession had more impact on EU countries than it did in the United States and that Europe was hit by a secondary recession when the U.S. was not, due to Europe's lack of a sufficient monetary policy response, insistence on austerity measures, and the use of the crisis to advance a political agenda. ^[18] Weisbrot claims that the European Central Bank is less accountable to EU citizens than the Federal Reserve in the United States and was unable or unwilling to replicate the Fed's recover measures of quantitative easing and a prolonged 0% interest rate. ^[19]Additionally, he blames Europe's slow recovery from the crisis on austerity-focused policies that reduced government spending, cut pensions, and weaken labor protections,^[20] stating that many countries could have shortened the period of economic decline and recovery be leaving the Eurozone.^[21]

Weisbrot makes the case that the EU and the European Monetary Union are ideologically different organizations, with the more conservative EMU subjecting low-income member countries to the same policies the IMF has imposed outside of Europe. ^[22]

In 2011, Weisbrot was critical of the Troika (European group) and the IMF, claiming that the former had placed constraints on the Greek economy that caused continual loss of GDP and that the IMF's demands for austerity would make recovery difficult. ^[23]Weisbrot advocated for the restructuring of Greece's debt as a better path forward than imposing austerity measures. He also advocated for the position that the European Central Bank undertake quantitative easing, citing the success of the Federal Reserve's actions in the United States. ^[24] Weisbrot also predicted that an economic recovery in Greece would be accelerated if Greece abandoned the Euro to avoid punitive measure attached to EU loans,^[25] claiming that reducing government spending during recessionary periods is not an effective means of creating the economic growth necessary to end a recession.^[26]

Weisbrot states that although the Asian economic crisis was precipitated by the sudden reversal of international capital flows, Asian economies were made vulnerable to such reversals by economic liberalization that was encouraged by the IMF. Additionally, Weisbrot claims that the crisis was exacerbated by the IMF's failure to act as a lender of last resort. ^[27][28]

The economist also claims that the IMF's insistence on structural reforms were not directly related to the crisis but contributed to the severity and length of the crisis. ^[29] SBCornelius (talk) 18:52, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestions. It will take time to go through the suggested changes. I looked through the first section on Latin America. Afaict the only change is an addition of one sentence at the end, namely:

In a 2019 report on the IMF program for Ecuador, Weisbrot found that the program was not likely to prevent continuing recession or reduce unemployment.

A few points:

• Is there a non-blog secondary source for this sentence? While the sugggested addition is not controversial, the two sources you have used are both blogs which some editors may consider inappropriate for a BLP.
• The report mentioned is by Mark Weisbrot and Andrés Arauz from the CEPR

Burrobert (talk) 05:01, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

I have incorporated the Venezuela and South of the Border sub-sections into the Latin America section as you suggested. You did not suggest any changes to the wording of either sub-section. Burrobert (talk) 13:26, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Regarding the Europe and Asia sections, the sources you have used are all primary sources written by Weisbrot. Are there any secondary sources that discuss his work in these areas? Burrobert (talk) 10:01, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Burrobert, thanks for the feedback. I'll take some time and dig back into my research and get back to you with alternative citations if possible. Thanks again for the help. SBCornelius (talk) 19:05, 1 July 2024 (UTC)