Macroeconomics is a sub-field of economics that examines the behavior of the economy as a whole, once all of the individual economic decisions of companies and industries have been summed. Economy-wide phenomena considered by macroeconomics include Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and how it is affected by changes in unemployment, national income, rate of growth, and price levels.
In contrast, microeconomics is the study of the economic behaviour and decision-making of individual consumers, firms, and industries.
Macroeconomics can be used to analyze how to influence government policy goals such as economic growth, price stability, full employment and the attainment of a sustainable balance of payments.
Macroeconomics is sometimes used to refer to a general approach to economic reasoning, which includes long term strategies and rational expectations in aggregate behavior.
Until the 1930s most economic analysis did not separate out individual economics behavior from aggregate behavior. With the Great Depression of the 1930s, suffered throughout the developed world at the time, and the development of the concept of national income and product statistics, the field of macroeconomics began to expand. Particularly influential were the ideas of John Maynard Keynes, who formulated theories to try to explain the Great Depression. Before that time, comprehensive national accounts, as we know them today, did not exist .
One of the challenges of economics has been a struggle to reconcile macroeconomic and microeconomic models. Starting in the 1950s, macroeconomists developed micro-based models of macroeconomic behavior (such as the consumption function). Dutch economist Jan Tinbergen developed the first comprehensive national macroeconomic model, which he first built for the Netherlands and later applied to the United States and the United Kingdom after World War II. The first global macroeconomic model, Wharton Econometric Forecasting Associates LINK project, was initiated by Lawrence Klein and was mentioned in his citation for the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 1980.
Theorists such as Robert Lucas Jr suggested (in the 1970s) that at least some traditional Keynesian (after British economist John Maynard Keynes) macroeconomic models were questionable as they were not derived from assumptions about individual behavior, although it was not clear whether the failures were in microeconomic assumptions or in macroeconomic models. However, New Keynesian macroeconomics has generally presented microeconomic models to shore up their macroeconomic theorizing, and some Keynesians have contested the idea that microeconomic foundations are essential, if the model is analytically useful. An analogy might be that the fact that quantum phisics is not fully consistent with relativity theory doesn´t mean that realtivity is false. Many important microeconomic assumptions have never been proved, and some have proved wrong.
The various schools of thought are not always in direct competition with one another - even though they sometimes reach differing conclusions. Macroeconomics is an ever evolving area of research. The goal of economic research is not to be "right," but rather to be accurate. It is likely that none of the current schools of economic thought perfectly capture the workings of the economy. They do, however, each contribute a small piece of the overall puzzle. As one learns more about each school of thought, it is possible to combine aspects of each in order to reach an informed synthesis.
The traditional distinction is between two different approaches to economics: Keynesian economics, focusing on demand; and supply-side (or neo-classical) economics, focusing on supply. Neither view is typically endorsed to the complete exclusion of the other, but most schools do tend clearly to emphasize one or the other as a theoretical foundation.
• Keynesian economics focuses on aggregate demand to explain levels of unemployment and the business cycle. That is, business cycle fluctuations should be reduced through fiscal policy (the government spends more or less depending on the situation) and monetary policy. Early Keynesian macroeconomics was "activist," calling for regular use of policy to stabilize the capitalist economy, while some Keynesians called for the use of incomes policies.
• Supply-side economics delineates quite clearly the roles of monetary policy and fiscal policy. The focus for monetary policy should be purely on the price of money as determined by the supply of money and the demand for money. It advocates a monetary policy that directly targets the value of money and does not target interest rates at all. Typically the value of money is measured by reference to gold or some other reference. The focus of fiscal policy is to raise revenue for worthy government investments with a clear recognition of the impact that taxation has on domestic trade. It places heavy emphasis on Say's law, which states that recessions do not occur because of failure in demand or lack of money.
• Monetarism, led by Milton Friedman, which holds that inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon. It rejects fiscal policy because it leads to "crowding out" of the private sector. Further, it does not wish to combat inflation or deflation by means of active demand management as in Keynesian economics, but by means of monetary policy rules, such as keeping the rate of growth of the money supply constant over time.
• New Keynesian economics, which developed partly in response to new classical economics, strives to provide microeconomic foundations to Keynesian economics by showing how imperfect markets can justify demand management.
• Austrian economics is a laissez-faire school of macroeconomics. It focuses on the business cycle that arises from government or central-bank interference that leads to deviations from the natural rate of interest.
• Post-Keynesian economics represents a dissent from mainstream Keynesian economics, emphasizing the role of uncertainty and the historical process in macroeconomics.
• New classical economics. The original theoretical impetus was the charge that Keynesian economics lacks microeconomic foundations -- i.e. its assertions are not founded in basic economic theory. This school emerged during the 1970s. This school asserts that it does not make sense to claim that the economy at any time might be "out-of-equilibrium". Fluctuations in aggregate variables follow from the individuals in the society continuously re-optimizing as new information on the state of the world is revealed. Later yielded an explicit school which argued that macro-economics does not have micro-economic foundations, but is instead the tool of studying economic systems at equilibrium.
宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)是一種分場(chǎng)經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)的行為,研究是在整個(gè)經(jīng)濟(jì)中,一旦所有的個(gè)人的經(jīng)濟(jì)決策,為公司和產(chǎn)業(yè)被.宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)認(rèn)為經(jīng)濟(jì)現(xiàn)象包括國(guó)內(nèi)生產(chǎn)總值(GDP)以及它是如何變化影響失業(yè)的國(guó)民收入的)經(jīng)濟(jì)成長(zhǎng)率、價(jià)格水平.
相反,微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)研究的就是經(jīng)濟(jì)行為和決策的個(gè)體消費(fèi)者,公司和行業(yè).
宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)可以用來(lái)分析如何影響政府的政策的目標(biāo),比如經(jīng)濟(jì)增長(zhǎng),價(jià)格穩(wěn)定,充分就業(yè)和獲取可持續(xù)國(guó)際收支差額.
宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)有時(shí)用來(lái)指一個(gè)經(jīng)濟(jì)理論的主要途徑,包括長(zhǎng)期戰(zhàn)略的期望和理性綜合行為.
直到30年代為止,大部分的經(jīng)濟(jì)分析沒(méi)有獨(dú)立的個(gè)人經(jīng)濟(jì)綜合行為舉止.與1930年代的經(jīng)濟(jì)大蕭條,遭受了在所有發(fā)達(dá)國(guó)家,發(fā)展國(guó)民收入的概念和產(chǎn)品的統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)據(jù),但是研究領(lǐng)域的宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)開始擴(kuò)展.具有特殊影響力的想法是,約翰•梅納德凱恩斯理論,努力向他們解釋制定了經(jīng)濟(jì)大蕭條.在那時(shí)候,綜合國(guó)民經(jīng)濟(jì)核算,如同我們知道他們今天,是不存在的.
經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)的一個(gè)挑戰(zhàn)是一場(chǎng)斗爭(zhēng)調(diào)和宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)政策和微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)政策,模型.開始于20世紀(jì)50年代,macroeconomists發(fā)達(dá)micro-based模型的宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)行為(如消費(fèi)函數(shù)).1月Tinbergen荷蘭經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)家第一個(gè)全面發(fā)展國(guó)家宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)模型,該模型他第一次建成為荷蘭和后應(yīng)用于美國(guó)和英國(guó)二戰(zhàn)之后.第一個(gè)全球宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)模型,沃頓計(jì)量預(yù)測(cè)伙伴聯(lián)系工程項(xiàng)目,發(fā)生在勞倫斯發(fā)起克萊恩和被提及他的嘉獎(jiǎng)經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)諾貝爾經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)獎(jiǎng)1980年.
理論家如羅伯特·盧卡斯認(rèn)為(是在上世紀(jì)70年代),認(rèn)為至少有一些傳統(tǒng)的凱恩斯(英國(guó)經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)家約翰梅納德凱恩斯)宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)模型都是可疑的,因?yàn)樗麄儾皇莵?lái)源于假設(shè)的個(gè)人行為,雖然現(xiàn)在還不清楚這些失敗在微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)的假定,或是對(duì)宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)模型.然而,最新凱恩斯主義的宏觀微觀模型提出了大致以支持他們的宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)理論有爭(zhēng)議,一些凱恩斯主義者的想法,微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)基礎(chǔ)是必要的,如果模型是分析有用的.打個(gè)比方可能是,這樣的事實(shí),即量子phisics并不完全符合相對(duì)論´,并不代表沒(méi)有realtivity是假的.許多重要的微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)假設(shè)從來(lái)沒(méi)有被證明,而有些人的證明是錯(cuò)誤的.
各種各樣的思想學(xué)派并不總是在彼此的直接競(jìng)爭(zhēng),盡管他們有時(shí)會(huì)達(dá)到不同的結(jié)論.宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)是一種前所未有的領(lǐng)域的研究.研究經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)的目標(biāo)不是"正確",而是是精確的.很有可能是學(xué)校目前尚無(wú)一個(gè)經(jīng)濟(jì)思想完全捕捉運(yùn)作方式的經(jīng)濟(jì).不過(guò),他們的貢獻(xiàn)每一小塊整體難題.當(dāng)你學(xué)會(huì)更多關(guān)于每個(gè)思想學(xué)派,它能把方面的每一個(gè)為了達(dá)到一個(gè)通知的合成.
傳統(tǒng)的區(qū)別是留給經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)兩種不同的方法,重點(diǎn)凱恩斯經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)和供方需求;(或古典)經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)、關(guān)注供應(yīng).也都是典型的觀點(diǎn)完全排除其他,但大多數(shù)學(xué)校都往往清晰地強(qiáng)調(diào)一個(gè)或另一個(gè)是的理論基礎(chǔ).
•凱恩斯經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)交融在總需求,以解釋失業(yè)率和商業(yè)周期.商業(yè)周期波動(dòng),應(yīng)減少通過(guò)財(cái)政政策(政府花費(fèi)或多或少根據(jù)實(shí)際情況)和貨幣政策.早期凱恩斯主義的宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)是“活動(dòng)家,定期使用《召喚的政策穩(wěn)定資本主義經(jīng)濟(jì),雖然有些凱恩斯主義要求使用收入政策.
•供給的經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)的作用很明顯地在當(dāng)前貨幣政策與財(cái)政政策.關(guān)注于貨幣政策應(yīng)該是完全對(duì)價(jià)格的錢所確定的貨幣供應(yīng)的需求的特點(diǎn),為了金錢.它提倡貨幣政策,直接目標(biāo)錢的價(jià)值,不目標(biāo)利率.典型的錢的價(jià)值在于用參考金或其他參考.財(cái)政政策的重點(diǎn)是提高政府農(nóng)業(yè)投資價(jià)值的收入為一個(gè)明確的認(rèn)識(shí)稅收的影響在國(guó)內(nèi)貿(mào)易.它設(shè)置了過(guò)度強(qiáng)調(diào)了說(shuō)的法律,它表明不會(huì)發(fā)生經(jīng)濟(jì)衰退需求下降、因?yàn)闆](méi)有缺錢.
•貨幣主義的帶領(lǐng)下,由弗里德曼,認(rèn)為始終通貨膨脹是一種貨幣現(xiàn)象.財(cái)政政策拒絕,因?yàn)闀?huì)導(dǎo)致“擠退”的私人生活.此外,它不希望對(duì)抗通貨膨脹或通貨緊縮采用主動(dòng)需求管理在凱恩斯經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué),通過(guò)貨幣政策規(guī)則,即堅(jiān)持的增長(zhǎng)速度恒定的錢.
凱恩斯•新經(jīng)濟(jì)發(fā)達(dá)的部分原因是為了適應(yīng)新古典經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)、致力于提供凱恩斯現(xiàn)代經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)的微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)基礎(chǔ)顯示出了市場(chǎng)的不完善就能名正言順的需求管理等.
•奧地利經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)是個(gè)自由放任主義的學(xué)校的宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì).它側(cè)重于商業(yè)周期,而政府或中央銀行的干擾導(dǎo)致偏離自然失業(yè)率的興趣.
•Post-Keynesian經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)所代表了凱恩斯經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)主流的作用,強(qiáng)調(diào)歷史過(guò)程中不確定性和宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì).
•新古典經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué).原理論動(dòng)力的費(fèi)用是凱恩斯經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)缺乏有效的微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)基礎(chǔ)——亦即其斷言不成立于基本經(jīng)濟(jì)理論.這所學(xué)校出現(xiàn)在20世紀(jì)70年代.這所學(xué)校斷言它是沒(méi)有道理的主張經(jīng)濟(jì)會(huì)隨時(shí)out-of-equilibrium”.波動(dòng)的總變量遵從的在這個(gè)社會(huì)的個(gè)人不斷re-optimizing新信息的狀態(tài)的世界就會(huì)顯現(xiàn)出來(lái).后來(lái)取得了一個(gè)顯式學(xué)校一樣,認(rèn)為宏觀經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)沒(méi)有微觀經(jīng)濟(jì)基礎(chǔ),反而學(xué)習(xí)經(jīng)濟(jì)系統(tǒng)的工具在平衡.