Top all-time · #4161
Brad DeLong
Personal blog · braddelong.substack.comeconomicsaihistory
Brad DeLong writes DeLong's Grasping Reality Weblog, a personal blog at braddelong.substack.com about economics, ai and history. Since 2021, 19 different Hacker News readers have linked it 22 times, most often “Cyrus Cylinder Translation: Propaganda from Babylon from the Year -539”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-11-02, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (6) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Brad DeLong's Substack is economics commentary by an economics professor, linked by HN readers as a recommended read. Commenters also cite its posts on SVB, Thiel and Haiti's debt.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 6 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Economy in the 2000s & Before: working, making, apportioning, talking, taking, & more. What I know and can learn about it, & related things.
Most-linked posts?
- Cyrus Cylinder Translation: Propaganda from Babylon from the Year -5392 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-12-17
- /2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-12-27
What Hacker News says?
I took Krugman's advice to read DeLong at one point and don't regret it, though he's not on my regular rotation: https://braddelong.substack.com
Comment linking /
on “The Demoralization is just Beginning”Submitted Understanding the Rise of “Socialism” as a story · 6 points
HN discussionAmazingly, that's a real quote from the book[1] (according to that source David Graeber blames bad editing), and it does raise questions about the credibility of anything else in that book. But that story about Haiti's debt can be found in better sources. 1: https://braddelong.substack.com/p/on-april-fools-day-we-reme...
Comment linking /p/on-april-fools-day-we-remember-david
on “Haiti’s President Is Assassinated”Submitted 70k Years of Human Economic Growth, Briefly as a story · 3 points
HN discussionNot GP, but two blogs I like are https://noahpinion.substack.com and https://braddelong.substack.com Both authors are quite witty, so their blogs are eminently readable. They're also trained in economics (have PhDs in economics) and are econ professors, so I put a lot more stock in the stuff they write (useful heuristic, but some may disagree) than in lynalden's posts. Economics is harder to separate from politics c…
Comment linking /
on “The Importance of Price Signals”Submitted Reading: John Lippert on the Idiocy of the Chicago School in Late 2008 as a story · 3 points
HN discussionContext has something to do with it, though the title's a poor one regardless IMO. On your own blog, to readers familiar with your topics and post history, "how the fuck did we get here" might be an acceptable / excusable title, though even there, I'd argue that it's a rather poor pick. It's a bit like dropping a URL or video link with the comment "lol" on an HN or Metaverse thread, say. There's not much to go on. E…
Comment linking /archive?sort=new
on “How the Fuck Did We Get Here?”Submitted Yes, You Can Trick AI into Exonerating Someone as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI leave it to others to judge the validity, but I found Brad DeLong's epithet for Thiel amusing ( https://braddelong.substack.com/p/saturday-night-thoughts-on... ): > Even so, SVB knew it had gotten itself into trouble—that it had put too large a share of its assets into long-term Treasuries that it intended to hold-to-maturity, and that while it was notionally hedged against interest-rate duration risk by this hold…
Comment linking /p/saturday-night-thoughts-on-the-need
on “SVB collapse: Peter Thiel’s role scrutinized as spark of bank run”Submitted Stochastic Parrots on the Palatine Hill: Monday MAMLMs as a story · 2 points
HN discussionUrl changed from https://braddelong.substack.com/p/reading-cyrus-cylinder , which points to this.
Comment linking /p/reading-cyrus-cylinder
on “Cyrus Cylinder Translation: Propaganda from Babylon from the Year -539”Submitted Bidenomics: Transitory Inflation, Remarkably Successful on Employment and Growth as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Reading: Jo Walton (1998): "The Lurkers Support Me in Email" as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Cyrus Cylinder Translation: Propaganda from Babylon from the Year -539 as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted How Special Is Programming as a Token-Infall Attractor? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Convergence in LLM Quality and Slowdown in LLM Improvement as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Coding Agents as Continuation of Technological Development of Code-Writing Tools as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Katie Martin's "Magnificent Seven" Today as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Is Silicon Valley VC Still a Societal Asset? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Þe Meaning of 1870: Þe Year Everything Changed as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why Can’t We All Be R̶I̶C̶H̶ Happy? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted One Image: Inflation Is a Better Problem to Have Than a Permanent Output Gap as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
