![]() ![]() What on earth (flat or not) inspired McAfee to publish such a paper, especially in an academic journal? ![]() FRAPPE, of course, is completely made up and like the rest of the article-including laugh-out-loud footnotes filled with clear falsehoods-it is comic gold. The FRAPPE model offers simple proof that America would have remained “relatively unchanged” had Columbus and his crew met their doom in space: “For proof, send $8.99 to Proof, Box 666, London, Canada (Canadians add $6),” McAfee writes. This “highly touted” model, he wryly continues, is called FRAPPE: “Fractured Reconstructive Autoerotic Projection Package with Econometrization.” ![]() “I construct a model of the earth, in which the implications of Columbus falling off the edge of the earth can be tested,” McAfee deadpans in one of the most respected academic journals for American economists. Instead of doing the same old thing, let’s sit back and ponder a question that economist Preston McAfee once posed in a paper published by the American Economic Review: what if the world is flat and, on his 1492 voyage, “Columbus fell off the edge of the earth?” Would America still be America? And how would that have affected economic growth? More of us will probably just sleep in and rejoice that for at least one week in October, we don’t have to suffer from a “case of the Mondays.”īut maybe this Columbus Day we should do something different. Some of us may use it to do something active. As deciduous trees shed their leaves and many of us begin to brace for the inevitable cold, Columbus Day provides a nice extra day off from work to spend with our friends and family. ![]()
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