bfinn was discounting Eliezer for being a non-economist, rather than discounting Sumner for being insufficiently mainstream; and bfinn was skeptical in particular that Eliezer understood NGDP targeting well enough to criticize the Bank of Japan. So Sumner seems unusually relevant here, and I’d expect him to pick up on more errors from someone talking at length about his area of specialization.
bfinn was discounting Eliezer for being a non-economist, rather than discounting Sumner for being insufficiently mainstream; and bfinn was skeptical in particular that Eliezer understood NGDP targeting well enough to criticize the Bank of Japan. So Sumner seems unusually relevant here, and I’d expect him to pick up on more errors from someone talking at length about his area of specialization.