Lars P. Syll

Putting theories to the test Mainstream neoclassical economists often maintain — usually referring to the methodological individualism of Milton Friedman — that it doesn’t matter if the assumptions of the theories and models they use are realistic or not. What matters is if the predictions are right or not. But, if so, then the only conclusion we can make is — throw away the garbage! Because, oh dear, oh dear, how wrong they have been! The empirical and...

Axioms — things to be suspicious of To me, the crucial difference between modelling in physics and in economics lies in how the fields treat the relative role of concepts, equations and empirical data … An economist once told me, to my bewilderment: “These concepts are so strong that they supersede any empirical observation” … Physicists, on the other hand, have learned to be suspicious of axioms. If empirical observation is incompatible with a model, the...

Thaler and behavioural economics — some critical perspectives Although discounting empirical evidence cannot be the right way to solve economic issues, there are still, in my opinion, a couple of weighty reasons why we perhaps shouldn’t be too excited about the so-called ’empirical revolution’ in economics. Behavioural experiments and laboratory research face the same basic problem as theoretical models — they are built on often rather artificial conditions...

Keynes — the first behavioural economist To-day, in many parts of the world, it is the serious embarrassment of the banks which is the cause of our gravest concern … [The banks] stand between the real borrower and the real lender. They have given their guarantee to the real lender; and this guarantee is only good if the money value of the asset belonging to the real borrower is worth the money which has been advanced on it. It is for this reason that a...

Nobel Committee making a colossal fool of itself In its ‘scientific background’ description on the 2017 ‘Nobel prize’ in economics, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences writes (emphasis added): In order to build useful models, economists make simplifying assumptions. A common and fruitful simplification is to assume that agents are perfectly rational. This simplification has enabled economists to build powerful models to analyze a multitude of different...

What is behavioural economics? [embedded content] Great lecture! Yours truly especially appreciates Thaler’s excursion into the history of economics, forcefully showing the amazing extent to which mainstream economics suffers from severe amnesia. And trying to save it as e. g. Paul Krugman, arguing that rationality “in some parts of economics … seems to be a bit of a noble lie, useful as a guide for thinking as long as you keep your tongue firmly in your...

Richard Thaler gets the 2017 ‘Nobel prize’ Today The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that it  has decided to award The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for 2017 to Richard Thaler. A good choice for once! To yours truly Thaler’s main contribution has been to show that one of the main building blocks of modern mainstream economics — expected utility theory — is fundamentally wrong. If a friend of yours...

I Filosofiska rummet diskuterade Mats Alvesson, Ebba Lisberg Jensen och Tapio Salonen förra veckan kvaliteten på samhällsvetenskaplig forskning. Mycket av dagens samhällsforskning är meningslöst nonsens. Anledningarna till detta är så klart många, men en viktig faktor är att det inom akademin nuförtiden är så viktigt att producera mycket snarare än bra och betydelsefull forskning. En riktigt bra bok eller artikel väger lätt mot tio mer eller mindre ointressanta och irrelevanta...

The limited real-world usefulness of economics Whole Foods is providing the world with a very interesting economics lesson. Immediately after Amazon bought the upscale grocery store chain, it cut prices substantially for many items on the shelves. As a result, sales have boomed by around 25 percent. Was the price cut a good move? Actually, the real lesson might be how little economics has to say … Interestingly, economics doesn’t shed much light on this...

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