| > ...these strong similarities are not what these authors choose to emphasize. This statement feels misleading, in that the similarities do not appear to be as significant as they are implying. The table they provide very clearly shows a significant difference between their 2010 findings and the HAP paper (-0.1 vs. 2.2 mean, a gap of over 2 percentage points). > These results are, in fact, of a similar order of magnitude to the detailed country by country results we present in table 1 of the AER paper Taken literally, this makes no sense. No one has ever claimed the HAP results were of a differing order of magnitude to their own. Given that this is a rebuttal to a research paper where numerical values are in dispute, I would have thought they would use the term ("order of magnitude") precisely, and not colloquially. > It is utterly misleading to speak of a 1% growth differential that lasts 10-25 years as small. Perhaps, but if a 1% growth differential is significant (HAP), then a 2.9% differential is massive (2010 RR), compounding the scale of their error. After all, their original 2010 work implied a mean 2.9% drop in the growth rate once debt climbed above 90%. That paints a significantly different picture than a decrease of 1 percentage point, resulting net positive growth rate (2.2%) as opposed to negative (-0.1%). While this is speculative on my part, I feel it's safe to say that had they originally reported these (allegedly) "very similar" numbers ( > 2% vs -0.1 %), their findings would not have gotten the same wide circulation in certain political circles that it did. Given that context, the whole "...but the numbers are kinda close..." argument falls a little flat IMHO. |