I think that our host is shooting at a moving target, and trailing a bit. Econ 101 is losing much of its power to empiricism--which includes peoples' lived experiences as well as the data-econometrics complex. If economists haven't gotten the memo yet, the consumers of economics--center-left politicians and policymakers, journos, bankers and lawyers--feel fewer qualms about ignoring silly-sounding Econ 101 arguments. These people know that Econ 101 remains useful in aligning one's priors with one's conclusions, but are quite happy to abandon their priors if the conclusions don't test out.
Related to this is the problem that lots of individual qualifications to the Econ 101 model don't, in general, add up to an alternative model. Olivier Blanchard has a quote comparing DSGE modelling to a haiku, in terms of formal structure. You take the basic model, tweak one of the assumptions and often get something interestingly different from the classical result. But no one ever combines lots of tweaks to produce a model that actually looks like the real macroecoonomy.
Well said and reflective of my experience. Nothing more common (and frustrating) than an economist pointing to work by obscure others on an area you have made a critique on only for them to come back with *crickets* when you say "so, of course you took that into account when you wrote your policy advice/newspaper column/twitter thread on what should be done next?"
Well, for a while it looked like every undergrad in the world was going to major in economics and models with utility functions, and feel that they were qualified to handle anything, but now it looks like every undergrad in the world will be doing computer science and machine learning. Not sure whether that's an improvement or the reverse.
I love this article as an explanation of the reality of specialisation within what are regarded as quite specialist fields at the macro level. I'm afraid I don't share your optimism about economist (and lawyers) being the only people to offer opinions way outside their specific expertise. Media and social media are full of apparently qualified "experts" who know little about the subject. Nothing illustrated this better in the pandemic than the array of doctors and scientists offering confident opinions on matters where, in many cases, the knowledge did not even exist at an early stage.
From my own experience in economics education, I’ve found it remarkable how little difference it felt like there was between what we were learning and what was considered cutting edge. In fields like physics, it feels like expertise correlates well with ‘rank’ for lack of a better word - you expect a professor to be significantly more well versed than an undergraduate, who is themselves a better source than a secondary school student. If you were presented with a physics problem, the prof would be far better placed to answer it than the undergraduate. However, one thing I’ve learnt through my course is that the same thing doesn’t seem to exist in economics. Not only do I know just how useless and incoherent a lot of economic theory is, I also know that the the stuff my teachers are researching and arguing is no better. As such insofar as I feel confident as an economist to comment on matters, it isn’t because I have some overinflated view as the the validity of what it is myself or others are specialising in, but quite the opposite - I know everyone who is speaking on this issue is just as clueless as I am, so what I say is rarely going to be much less valid than them, regardless of ‘seniority’.
D, if you hope that newspaper commentators have glanced at the facts, you hope for much!
These thoughts apply to epidemiology too.
And it’s telling how little Econ 101 has changed since I took it 40 years ago.
I think that our host is shooting at a moving target, and trailing a bit. Econ 101 is losing much of its power to empiricism--which includes peoples' lived experiences as well as the data-econometrics complex. If economists haven't gotten the memo yet, the consumers of economics--center-left politicians and policymakers, journos, bankers and lawyers--feel fewer qualms about ignoring silly-sounding Econ 101 arguments. These people know that Econ 101 remains useful in aligning one's priors with one's conclusions, but are quite happy to abandon their priors if the conclusions don't test out.
Related to this is the problem that lots of individual qualifications to the Econ 101 model don't, in general, add up to an alternative model. Olivier Blanchard has a quote comparing DSGE modelling to a haiku, in terms of formal structure. You take the basic model, tweak one of the assumptions and often get something interestingly different from the classical result. But no one ever combines lots of tweaks to produce a model that actually looks like the real macroecoonomy.
Well said and reflective of my experience. Nothing more common (and frustrating) than an economist pointing to work by obscure others on an area you have made a critique on only for them to come back with *crickets* when you say "so, of course you took that into account when you wrote your policy advice/newspaper column/twitter thread on what should be done next?"
Well, for a while it looked like every undergrad in the world was going to major in economics and models with utility functions, and feel that they were qualified to handle anything, but now it looks like every undergrad in the world will be doing computer science and machine learning. Not sure whether that's an improvement or the reverse.
I love this article as an explanation of the reality of specialisation within what are regarded as quite specialist fields at the macro level. I'm afraid I don't share your optimism about economist (and lawyers) being the only people to offer opinions way outside their specific expertise. Media and social media are full of apparently qualified "experts" who know little about the subject. Nothing illustrated this better in the pandemic than the array of doctors and scientists offering confident opinions on matters where, in many cases, the knowledge did not even exist at an early stage.
From my own experience in economics education, I’ve found it remarkable how little difference it felt like there was between what we were learning and what was considered cutting edge. In fields like physics, it feels like expertise correlates well with ‘rank’ for lack of a better word - you expect a professor to be significantly more well versed than an undergraduate, who is themselves a better source than a secondary school student. If you were presented with a physics problem, the prof would be far better placed to answer it than the undergraduate. However, one thing I’ve learnt through my course is that the same thing doesn’t seem to exist in economics. Not only do I know just how useless and incoherent a lot of economic theory is, I also know that the the stuff my teachers are researching and arguing is no better. As such insofar as I feel confident as an economist to comment on matters, it isn’t because I have some overinflated view as the the validity of what it is myself or others are specialising in, but quite the opposite - I know everyone who is speaking on this issue is just as clueless as I am, so what I say is rarely going to be much less valid than them, regardless of ‘seniority’.