Miller-Merton

This collection of speeches from the early/mid 1990s would be more correctly titled "Merton Miller on Regulation." Some of the speeches indeed cover the regulation of the derivatives markets. The speeches make for good reading, but this book is not a reference work for one's library. Good speeches must be relatively simple and entertaining. These are. But one should not expect a rigorous investigation of regulation (nor of derivatives regulation) in this book. The advertising on this book is misleading. This is not a book written by Merton Miller. It is a good collection of speeches given by him.

Merton Miller, who died in 2001, was an outstanding figure in modern economics. He was one of three financial economists to win the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1990, in his case for his work on the capital structure of corporations - a field that, with his associate Franco Modigliani, he revolutionised if not invented. His great insight was that the value of a company, other things being equal, is invariant with regard to the mix of debt and equity that makes up its capital structure - or, to invoke one of Miller's own picturesque analogies, if I take a dollar out of my right pocket and put it into my left pocket, I am no better off.

This book is a collection of speeches given by Miller in the early to mid-1990s, largely covering the subjects of the derivatives revolution, regulation and corporate governance. The subject matter sounds dry; the speeches are anything but. Miller's jokes are exceptionally good - he has great sport in particular by satirising the convoluted German system of corporate cross-shareholdings, and reflecting ruefully on the inevitable question that is always posed to professional economists ('what will happen to interest rates?' - to which the only sensible answer is 'they will fluctuate'). But underlying the wit and engaging manner is a serious and profound point. Modern finance consists principally in the management of risk. Derivatives perform an exceptionally valuable function in a modern, complex economy by enabling economic agents to accomplish this end. Ill-conceived regulation can do harm by making it impossible for corporations to manage their business risk efficiently; this will have significant economic cost, with no compensating social benefit.

Many collections of speeches are testament merely to an author's vanity, and do not last beyond the occasions for which the speeches were written. This one is different: it is the fruit of an extraordinary intellect, a fine prose style, and a formidable technical expertise. It deserves to last, and is much to be recommended.

Accidently I met this book on the lecture-the one about the risk management.I guess Merton Miller is a great story teller. And most of them are full of wisdom and financial philosophy. The M&M theory is one of the milestone in the finance which does intrigue a lot of work about Leveage buyout,coporate governace,etc. This one also contains a lecture he gave in the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm for his Noble prize winning.The one is titled "Leverage". I guess I am moved

and totally.....Mr. Miller has many greatest students,as you know,the one is Fama, another great scholar in the finance society.This book is a collection of his lectures he gave before.Unfortunately, Mr. Miller died in June,2000.So this one seems turn out to be the last fine words he gives us.

This book is not for lay people or even undergraduates. Not that it is all that technically demanding. Rather, it is unusual in its style and content. This text is a landmark in modern macroeconomics. It begins with a very simple model for the ideas of Thomas Malthus. It was the first to place the neoclassical growth model at center stage. It is the first place to discuss in print what later became known as Ricardian Equivalence. It was written at the very dawn of the rational expectations - market clearing revolution in macro, yet betrays a deeper understanding of those ideas than most contemporary texts.

It makes a radical break with IS-LM (regrettably entrenched for over 50 years) and proposes an alternative with the real interest rate (r) on one axis and the price level (P) on another. The M curve represents combinations of r and P consistent with equilibrium in the supply and demand for real balances. The Y curve represents combinations consistent of the same, consistent with market clearing for goods. The intersection of M and Y determine P and r. Real output does not appear on either axis because it is determined by the labor market. Sticky wages or prices can be (and are) incorporated into the model. I find the M-Y model much more natural than IS-LM with AD-AS.

Much of the discussion is built around a computer simulation model, probably long vanished, that reminds me of a deterministic version of a simple real business cycle model. Miller and Upton understood that a lot of macroeconomics can be explored within a spreadsheet, even though spreadsheets had yet to be invented!

Finally, the prose is rich and beautiful, reflecting the shining influence of the late Merton Miller, a wise and witty writer.